Palm Theatre: SLO Film Center San Luis Obispo, CA
Saule Baipsys
Outreach and Volunteer Coordinator at The Dunes Center
andSebastian Alvarez
Department of Geography at the University of California, Santa Barbara
andDan Robinette
Coastal Program Leader, Point Blue Conservation Science
House of Sand— Shaping the Dunes: Exploring Life in an Everchanging System
Program Description
Join us for our next Science on Screen selection, THE HOUSE OF SAND (2005), a mesmerizing portrait of people, place, and time set against an ever-shifting world of dunes. After the screening, Saule Baipsys of The Dunes Center, Sebastian Alvarez of UC Santa Barbara’s Department of Geography, and Dan Robinette, Principal Scientist & Coastal Program Leader at Point Blue Conservation Science, will help uncover what our own local dunes can teach us.
The discussion will walk through the themes of film primarily pertaining to the passage of time, highlighting the connection of geomorphology and anthropology while providing anthropological context. By reflecting on the passage of time, we will mirror these points as they pertain to our local dunes and the stories that they hold. By exploring this life and history, we will better understand how natural processes in the dunes have changed because of climatic and anthropological stressors.
Presented At
Palm Theatre: SLO Film Center San Luis Obispo, CA
Film Synopsis
In 1910, a woman is taken along with her mother to a far-away desert by her husband, and after his passing, is forced to spend the next 59 years of her life hopelessly trying to escape it.
Filmed entirely on the magnificent, sandy coast of northern Brazil, The House of Sand is the story of a woman across three generations. Áurea's saga begins in 1910, in Maranhão, where her fanatical husband has relocated his family to start a farm. Desperate and pregnant, Áurea longs to return to the city, but cannot traverse the dunes with her aging mother, Maria, in tow. Eventually, they settle among the shifting sands and Áurea finds peace. But her passionate daughter, Maria, longs to explore the world beyond the dunes. Set against the backdrop of a half-century's scientific and technological evolution, The House of Sand is a poetic meditation on the physics of time and the biology of human variation.
About the Speaker
Saule Baipsys is the Outreach and Volunteer Coordinator at The Dunes Center, where she brings together her love for people and the natural world. Along with obtaining her Environmental Management and Protection degree, she participated in research and fellowships which deepened her love and understanding of conservation and California’s unique natural resources.
Sebastian Alvarez is a PhD student and researcher in the Department of Geography at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he studies the geomorphology of California’s coastal dunes and their response to sea level rise. His research combines field observations, remote sensing, and coastal change analysis to better understand dune resilience along the California coast.
Dan Robinette is the Coastal Program Leader for Point Blue Conservation Science (www.pointblue.org) where he leads research and monitoring programs focused on developing marine birds as indicators of ecosystem condition. His research projects include investigating the impacts of human-caused disturbance, climate change, and habitat restoration on coastally breeding birds.