This is the story of Eduardo Navarro (Buenos Aires, 1979), an artist dedicated to the world of the ocean to the point that he wanted to become a seal to interact with them. And dressed in a suit that imitates them, he has managed to get the rescued baby seals from a shelter in Uruguay to take the bottle with him. And play pretend that he is one of yours. Play theater. But it is also the story of Pedro, a 500 kilo seal that is no longer clear if he is rather a human in the shape of a seal. And also, the history of contemporary art’s absolute fascination with the oceans, which is manifested in a multitude of works, exhibitions and biennials.
This week Barcelona hosts the great Conference of the Decade of the Oceans, under the leadership of UNESCO. Their motto is “use the science we need to have the oceans we want”, oceans that were the beginning of life, they remember, and are key to a sustainable and equitable future. But in addition to science, contemporary art is also immersed in them. “In the seventies and eighties – Navarro points out – there were many utopias in which there was talk of building spaceships and everyone projected the future in outer space, technology was going to lead us to colonize the cosmos. From the disappointment that there was, from not reaching anything, in contrast the only point that still remains a mystery on an almost cosmological level is the ocean. It is as if it were the cosmos inside planet Earth. It gives the possibility of immersing oneself in a terrain that is still unknown but within what is possible and real in humans and in the planet itself.”
During the pandemic, Navarro was in Uruguay and thought, within his line of work, to interact with the orphaned baby seals from the SOS marine shelter, whose promoter he has known for years. “And the idea came up of what if I’m a seal instead of just going there and looking at it. The possibility of becoming a seal.” He decided that he would do it in a seal suit.
“It involves a process of change. The suit is like a vehicle, in the same way that people put on masks in rituals to access a different way of thinking or seeing the world. Being an artist is a mask in itself that allows a dynamic with society and with the universe that is like a kind of bridge. And that mask of being a seal, which is the way you walk, the noise, the fins, the weight, generates a physical condition and at the same time a more spiritual instance of making contact with something greater than the human.”
But his action is more than the suit. “They are in a state of stress, of crisis, the orphaned seals have been collected and taken to the shelter to be fed. Getting them to trust is a whole process. It cost me”. They approached him, sniffed him… “For communion to occur I have to come out of my human disguise. Breathe, relax, enter another language.” The trust came and was able to give them the “fish daiquiris with protein powder” that they eat. And a game also started. “It’s similar to people with art: you know it’s not real but you surrender to a belief system, to assume what the artist is channeling as true. When I put on the suit I give them license to have fun because they are humans of the sea in some way, sea lions and seals have a very great need to play. And there is a kind of communion between two entities that come from different universes. Clearly I don’t smell like a seal and I can’t exactly imitate the way they scream and talk. But they are being empathetically friendly to someone who is in some way surrendering to their cosmos. I guess they must laugh after I leave.”
And he says that in any case the self-conception of human beings is “so conceptual, so based on who I am, who the other is, what nature is, that the idea that I am a seal is like a mantra for me, it has the intuition to dissolve that human idiosyncrasy. In that I am a seal, I don’t know how much of a seal I am, but I know that there is an integration with something greater.”
And he emphasizes that “they are very loving animals and have personality. One is very loud, the other plays a lot, the other is very dominant. It’s interesting to see up close how sophisticated they are as a culture. And they return them to the sea and come back. There is a seal called Pedro who is huge, he is 18 years old, and they release him and he reappears. The refuge is on the sea. In the sea, free, Pedro would have an infinite amount of food. He could be playing in the waves and mating. And yet, he prefers to be there in a cement pool, where they wet him with a hose and feed him. Here it gets interesting who is who, it’s a human who is a seal, a seal who is human… Pedro likes to be in a seclusion of what the ocean is. “Pedro is quite human at this point.”
Navarro admits that “putting on the suit has an almost magical component, that transformation. I can’t imagine stopping doing it. Until I get my spine, I imagine until I’m 80 years old, if I still have some consciousness and physical motor skills, putting on the suit and doing that. Just like Pedro has become a little human. I have the feeling of being part of something much bigger when I put on the suit and interact with them. It gives me a meditative state afterwards. It takes away my anxiety and speculation, and gives me a very gratifying feeling of peace. I recommend doing the seal. People are very alienated in their neurosis and fears. There is nothing more empathetic than making a connection with the animal kingdom.”
The artist has created the project F.o.c.a. (Oceanic Foundation of Loving Contemplation), awarded a scholarship by the Botín Foundation, and wants to create a space where writers and artists can go. And he wants to generate a photographic archive, of stories, poetry, films, about “this interaction with play and the ocean and affection, and it would be incredible if in the end it ends up open to the public and acts as an oceanic talisman, where one accesses a more intuitive information.
