Playing Becoming-Animal: (Co)explorations in the Sierra Madre Oriental

This text focuses specifically on the function of playing as a central component of the Matorral smbiótico installation, a research-by-design project implemented in the Sierra Madre Oriental of Mexico and equipped with an ecological route and a set of landscape installations that favor environmental awareness through playful interactions with nature. The playful dimension is particularly fundamental for the schoolchildren guided through the exploration of the floral and faunal biodiversity of the matorral shrubland by artists and activists participating in the co-creation of the project. The central glade of the project concentrates installations in which visitors are invited to engage in playful, semi-choreographed activities by impersonating resident species of the matorral and to adopt alternative perspectives for a multisensorial perception of the environment. The “power of play” is tested as a tool to destabilize conventional ways of thinking and develop a fairer attitude towards nature and society.