Mikhail Karikis’s film, No Ordinary Protest (a research project from which this image is drawn) adopts Ted Hughes’s children’s science fiction novel The Iron Woman (1993) as an ecofeminist parable in which communal listening and noise-making become tools to transform the world. In this story, a female superhero gifts children with a mysterious power—a noise. Transmitted by touch, this noise resonates with the collective howl of creatures affected by the pollution of the planet. As the children take matters of ecological devastation into their own hands, they infiltrate factories and “infect” adults with their demand for immediate action.
Engaging with a group of 7-year-olds from a London primary school, Karikis co-created a film which reflects on environmental themes of Hughes’s book and imagines the enigmatic noise that assists the protagonists in their protest. The children wear colourful—yet foreboding—masks of their own making (pictured here) which are used to enliven and collectivize their protest. While being uncertain about our ecological future, No Ordinary Protest uncovers children’s political voices and activist imaginations, where communal listening and noise-making become tools that can “move mountains” and transform our world.