Cambium

In response to a pine felling project on a small plot of land in El Valle de Arce, filmmakers Marina Lameiro and Maddi Barber took the decision to film that forest in order to secure the spirit of the place, the childhood games and the vigour of its nature in memory. That was the first part of the two-part project that today exists as Cambium, first released in 2021 under the title of Paraíso.

Years later, the filmmakers from Navarre return to the same pine forest to see the results of that felling project and to see what has become of the place. They begin with the obviousness that contact with Nature is not free of violence. Humans change Nature and vice-versa. It is in that confirmation, in that amalgamation of sensations felt— the paradise and its imminent radical transformation— where the loving yet rigorous gaze of Barber and Lameiro over the landscape gains strength and precision.

Through the contrast suggested by that dual time and by the presence and absence of the pine forest, the initial need to communicate with the trees, to celebrate and persist in the landscape is better understood: the first part perhaps contains an act of thanks; it then being necessary to document the felling without even a hint of nostalgia, presenting the technology that will enable the change, the work and the relief. To feel again, in that transformation, a respect for the Earth and the need to accept the times and cycles of Nature, as well as the relationship of interdependence and respect between Mankind and Nature.

Anna Brufau