Raqs Media Collective – The Tides of our Tears

Augmented reality text appearing on a phone screen overlaid on the river Thames — Augmented Reality text piece appearing on phone screen, overlaid on the riverscape of the Thames at Richmond

Part of Richmond Arts & Ideas Festival 13–29 June, 2025.

I was pleased to be able to work again with fantastic Delhi-based contemporary art group Raqs Media Collective and with Invisible Dust to present a trail of augmented reality poems along the regularly flooding Thames riverside path, ‘The Tideway’, as part of Richmond Arts & Ideas Festival 2025.

Set against the backdrop of the river’s extreme tides—rising up to seven metres—the works resonate with Richmond’s deep ties to the Thames and its shifting, often unpredictable nature.

As the UK Environment Agency notes, climate change is intensifying “Richmond’s ‘peak river flow, sea level rise, wind speed, wave height and storm surge”, leading to more frequent and severe flooding events.

Developed through conversations with scientists at UCL in conjunction with the Royal Docks, the poems weave together references to detritus, data, trade, and capital—tracing the turbulent currents of ecological and economic systems. But just as crucially, they speak to the inner tides of the body, especially tears, linking planetary flux with human emotion.

Set along a route from Richmond Bridge to Eel Pie island, the poems appear over the water of the Thames when you scan a QR code with your smartphone.

Also part of the project is a text piece in Richmond centre and a series of stamps of the QR codes/drawings on the plaques which visitors can collect at the different festival venues.