Royal Hastings, University of London Multimedia Art MA Final Project

Candidate name: Ludya Parak

Candidate number: 0883481

What the final project taught me:

I don’t keep a diary, because life’s about the future, right? When a day’s over, it’s done with. Having said that, keeping one would’ve helped me write this essay. It would also have put me away. If I ever have to stand up and defend my actions, then I’ll say I was doing it for the kids. Because that’s true. I didn’t want them – they just happened. I had stars in my eyes, thanks to their dad, who made me think a little life in a little house was what he wanted too. That was the trouble – he wanted two. Another woman on the other side of town. Difference was, she knew all about me. I only found out about her when he left his phone tracker on. He was supposed to be driving to Tring for work, only he was less than a mile away. This is how na?ve I was: I raced round to her flat, ready to confront whoever it was had stolen his phone …

I didn’t want kids because there are too many people in the world and the world is dying. Why add to the pressure on the planet by dumping more on it, for my own selfish reasons? Some call it a ‘birth strike’, but before he came along and changed my mind, it made perfect sense to me.

Once they arrive, nature makes you care for them, and now they mean more to me than anything. Now it’s not about changing other people’s minds on the climate crisis, but literally taking my children’s future into my own hands.

I met Jonathan Danners at a conference. He wasn’t like the swampies and hippies and geeky activists. I’m not saying they aren’t my people, but you can spot them a mile away and that’s the trouble. Jonathan wore a suit. He had the accent, the background in science. I told him to his face: he could speak for the organisation and people would take him seriously. Only he didn’t want that. He’d rather stay in the shadows and DO something than stand in the light and just talk.

I met Suzie later, once the three of us were made a sleeper unit. At first I wondered what it would be like working with a married couple, but they were always professional. My issue was fitting work around childcare, finding the time for everything. Exactly like normal life.

We were all chosen for the RD 8 project because we had backgrounds in art and design – kind of. I had no doubts about doing the course, only about fitting it all in. The art was therapeutic, but working in a tiny group day after day was intense. We threw ourselves into it and a whole heap of angst came with that. When we got to Somerset we had work to do: find evidence of RD 8’s atmospheric defence tech, photograph it, then expose them as environmental terrorists. It felt right. As if everything was going our way. Suzie had a contact in the palm of her hand. I had the tech know-how and Jonathan had the organisational skillset.

He and I created the diversion while Suzie got where she had to go, using her contact’s codes. Later we discovered they’d set us up, but you know what killed it? The most basic mistake of all. The contact mistook a right turn for a left – so when Suzie took the unit, she stole something else, something RD 8 wanted back asap and at any cost. That’s why, when we got to the motel, this shit finally got real.