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Description
Saltwater Breath is a poetic, experimental documentary set along the Cornish coast, where a collective of women gather at the edge of the Atlantic to rehearse an unlikely act, a synchronized swim in cold open water.
As the swimmers move through breath, immersion, and choreographed repetition, their bodies become sites of resistance against the proposed Rosebank oil field. Rooted in ecofeminist practice, their actions reclaim the ocean not as a resource, but as a living relation that is intimate, ancestral, and alive.
The film traces their journey from rehearsal into collective action, interweaving the protest with quiet, personal encounters between each woman and the sea. These moments reveal a deeply embodied knowledge of care, interdependence, and what is at stake when extractive systems threaten living ecosystems.
Shot on 16mm and hand processed in seawater using low impact, experimental methods, Saltwater Breath is itself a work of eco art. Its material process mirrors its subject, tactile, immersive, and in direct collaboration with the ocean it seeks to honor.
Blurring the boundaries between documentary, performance, and environmental art, Saltwater Breath offers a sensory act of witnessing, where activism is not declared, but felt.
