A Journey Into the Living Knowledge of the Forest is a sensorial journey through the greenhouses of the Zurich Botanical Garden, experienced as an immersive audio walk.
The project brings together Indigenous, scientific, and artistic ways of knowing the forest. Developed through an ongoing exchange between these perspectives, it explores how knowledge is carried, shared, transformed, remembered—and sometimes lost.
The work brings together the Cámara-Leret research group at the University of Zurich, Indigenous knowledge holders from the Amazon, including Armando Nacimiento and Victoria Angel Ruiz of the Tikuna people from San Martín de Amacayacu, and artists Antoine Bertin and Cristina Tarquini.
Rather than presenting a single account of the forest, the project creates a space where different forms of knowledge can meet. Stories, observations, scientific research, lived experience, and cultural memory overlap and sometimes diverge, inviting us to consider what each way of knowing can reveal—and what might remain unseen.
This website is a living extension of this encounter. It is not a complete record of the project, but an ever-growing collage of fragments gathered through conversations, fieldwork, research, images, sounds, memories, and shared experiences. Like the forest itself, it has no single centre or fixed path. It will continue to evolve as the collaboration unfolds, offering glimpses into the people, plants, knowledge, and questions that have shaped the journey.
The work invites you to slow down, listen closely, and allow yourself to get a little lost within the forest, and within the many ways of knowing it.
Public Talk // 5 September
The project will be introduced during Lange Nacht der Museen in Zurich on Saturday, 5 September 2026. A public conversation will take place from 6:30–7:30 p.m., offering an introduction to the project and the ideas, encounters and collaborations that shaped the audio walk.
The Audio Walk // 6–13 September
The immersive audio walk will be open to the public from 6–13 September 2026, at the Zurich Botanical Garden.
Sessions run from 5:00–7:00 p.m., with two groups taking part during each session.
The experience takes place within the greenhouses, where visitors move through the garden while listening to the audio work and encountering the plants and environments that form part of the journey.
Register here
Credits
Antoine Bertin & Cristina Tarquini — Artists
Helen Morgan — Producer
Robert Borghesi — Visual Development
Francesco Cocco — Dramaturgy
Leo Mercier — R&D
Indigenomics Lab | University of Zurich
Rodrigo Cámara-Leret, Prof. Dr.
Juan Carlos Copete Maturana
Kimberly Castro
Melanie Kleineberg
Nisha Marwaha
Community of San Martín de Amacayacu
Sofia Victoria Angel Ruiz
Armando Javier Nacimiento
Eulogio David Vasquez Reina
Yenison Mozombite Florez
Grimanesa Luis de Ángel
Nidia Nasly Paima Ramos
Mariela Gregorio Paima
María Elena Noriega Gregorio
Esperanza Paima Vasquez
Ercilia Gregorio Paima
Alexis Robiro Paima Vasquez
Botanical Garden | University of Zurich
Moritz Kramer
Manuela Dahinden
Dominika Randazzo
and the gardening team
A Journey Into the Living Knowledge of the Forest has been funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation.
