TransATLANTIC Constellation:
Atlantic Water Connections for Flood Resilience
This is an invitation to take part in TransATLANTIC Constellation, a pilot dialogue initiated by Seila Fernández Arconada that brings together people with knowledge of different water realities across the Atlantic for a shared online conversation about flood resilience. The initiative grew out of the project "O Fio da Água, Embracing Water's Flow for Resilient Futures" (more information on this project appears further below).
The proposal responds to finds on the research process realising that there is a need for connection and learning between the different communities that share the watery territory of the Atlantic, and the uncertainty that comes with it. By bringing people together across disciplines, cultural contexts, and ecosystems, the gathering asks one guiding question: how can "we" become more resilient to water?
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Rethinking the Atlantic
TransATLANTIC Constellation invites a shift in how we see the Atlantic Ocean: not as a vast void separating continents, but as connective tissue linking distant coastlines that share water-related climate uncertainty. The pilot is designed to map a network of connections across the Atlantic basin, starting from Esposende (Portugal) where Seila Fernández Arconada is currently focused, drawing lines toward other locations that share similar environmental conditions, such as the presence of dunes and estuaries or the complex intersection of coastal and river flooding.
By bringing these different water territories into dialogue, the project seeks to share situated knowledge about how different communities relate to today's water-related uncertainties.
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The constellation: connected geographies
The pilot brings together voices from a set of key points on the map. Despite their geographical and cultural differences, these places are linked by their watery nature and their shared vulnerability to rising tides and shifting river flows.
- Esposende, Portugal, is the starting point of the constellation: an estuary and dune ecosystem contending with historic river flooding, as well as coastal erosion and flooding.
- New York, United States, is a coastal metropolis exposed to powerful storm surges and estuary vulnerability, navigating the tension between rigid infrastructure and ecological restoration.
- Cádiz, Spain, is an ancient peninsular city profoundly shaped by the sea, facing coastal storms and tsunami risk.
- Belém do Pará, Brazil, is the gateway to the Amazon, where the river meets the Atlantic, posing unique challenges from intense rainfall, tidal flooding, and delta dynamics.
- The Azores, Portugal, is an archipelago in the middle of the Atlantic, exposed to extreme ocean conditions and coastal erosion, with a need to strengthen community resilience.
- Bristol, United Kingdom, is a city with a deep history tied to a tidal river, managing major tidal swings, river flooding, and estuary management.
- Miami, United States, is a low-lying coastal city built on porous limestone facing sea-level rise.
- Costa Rica's Atlantic coast faces a recurring, severe flooding problem, driven by steady rainfall throughout the year, the region's flat topography, and the overflow of its powerful rivers during events such as cold fronts and tropical waves.
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Main objectives
- Mapping situated knowledge: the gathering is a chance to share, compare, and learn from local, community, and institutional responses to coastal and river uncertainty.
- Reimagining the Atlantic: it aims to shift the perception of the ocean from a dividing barrier into a shared space of mutual learning and ecological interconnection.
- Comparing resilience practices: it looks at how territories with similar physical features, such as dunes, estuaries, and floodplains, adapt, weighing large-scale engineering approaches against those centered on nature-based or community-led solutions.
- Weaving transnational networks: it lays the groundwork for a lasting network of water territories able to keep sharing resources, stories, and support beyond this pilot gathering.
- Artistic research and transdisciplinary approaches: the whole methodology is grounded in the idea that uncertain times call for new kinds of questions and connections, bringing together a diverse range of people and institutions to jointly reimagine how we live alongside water.
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Format
TransATLANTIC Constellation pilot will take the form of a two-hour online dialogue, held on a day in mid October 2026, (as soon as all participants confirm will be scheduled with a doodle). Workshop is conducted in English.
The session will be moderated by Seila Fernández Arconada, who will structure and guide the contributions within the digital space, with the format designed to be dynamic and to spark a cross-pollination of visual ideas.
After the gathering, participants will consider together whether to take things further with a suitable funding model; continuing beyond the pilot is not obligatory. If the experimental space proves to be of interest, the initiative will be expanded through dedicated funding, building a long-term working framework in which these spaces and their tangible outcomes can be fully realised.
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Background: "O Fio da Água"
TransATLANTIC Constellation grew out of "O Fio da Água: Embracing Water's Flow for Resilient Futures," a project exploring the watery relationships between local communities and their territory, and seeking to transform flood-prone populations' perceptions of water uncertainties into an imaginative coexistence. Through transdisciplinary, process-based research, the project focuses on hidden water flows, historical adaptations, and community memories of flooding events, exploring human-water coexistence to inspire alternative ways of "being with water".
The project has brought to life a diverse range of artistic works and community activities, including a month-long exhibition in transformation at the local archive, a participatory full-moon intervention at the old lighthouse combining sound, collective creation, and an AR sculpture as a ritualistic form of togetherness, a series of experimental publications conceived as a "portable exhibition," public exchange spaces such as "Flood Conversations," and experimental sound podcasts, among others.
O Fio da Água is led by Seila Fernández Arconada, a Spanish artist and researcher based in Berlin. It was selected for "S+T+ARTS AQUA MOTION: Transformative Synergies for Improved Water Management," supported by the European Commission, responding to the challenge "Moving Waters – Reimagining Flood Resilience," and is developed with Rio Neiva - Associação Defesa do Ambiente, residency host partner of S+T+ARTS.
More information is available at linktr.ee/ofiodaagua.
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Call for participant speakers
We are looking for one knowledgeable expert connected to each water context, to give that territory a voice and bring it into dialogue with the other territories, cultural contexts, and water realities.
Any discipline is welcome, as long as there is genuine interest in taking part. The points on the map above are a preliminary proposal, open to the inclusion of other territories; however, the number of speakers will be limited to fit the duration of the gathering.
If you are interested in taking part as a speaker representing one of these water contexts, or know someone who might be, please get in touch by email at [email protected].
Join as audience
Alongside the invited speakers, there is a possibility of opening the gathering up for the public to follow live,
If you would like to be kept informed and considered as part of the audience, please follow O Fio da Água or Seila Fernández Arconada Social media: LinkedIN, Facebook and Instagram.