Our water-based environments are facing major challenges. We are all individually and collectively responsible for their protection and health. This requires altering our relationship with our rivers, seas, and oceans, through systemic changes in our lifestyles and policies.
Blue Genes is about the young blue generations. It reflects that our genes have evolved and will evolve through both hereditary symbiosis between different organisms and the epigenetic influence of our environment. But its meaning goes much beyond, as life implies an interdependence of psychological, biological, physical, social and cultural phenomena. Living beings do not only learn, react and evolve to the environment but they also co-produce and live the environment, their cognition and consciousness develops by interacting with the environment. This environmental cognition or action (enaction) defines how we live, as there is not a gap between sensing, feeling and being.
The Blue Genes community are people who share a common harmonic vision of our belonging to nature and to the Ocean as its central and essential component. We are concerned about the state of our oceans and want to find new ways to increase our connection and engagement with the marine environment, through collective activities that combine materials, texts, sounds, visuals - at the interface of Science & Arts.
Founded in 2022, Blue Genes has grown into a formally established association based in Barcelona. What began as a series of online workshops soon evolved into in-person gatherings, where ideas took shape and collaborations flourished. From these meetings emerged research proposals and project concepts centred on strengthening young people’s connection with the Ocean and other aquatic environments. Visit our “Actions” section to discover some of the initiatives that have already become reality. Our early development was made possible thanks to the support of BAU College of Arts and Design of Barcelona and the Institut de Ciències del Mar (ICM-CSIC).
Over time, we’ve partnered with a wide range of organisations and hosted public activities with collaborators such as Fes! Cultura, Ajuntament de Barcelona, La Safor Association, ECOP Spain, and many others, as well as the EU project PREP4BLUE-Planning for Citizen Participation in Mission Ocean & Waters and OCEAN-AGORA. We continue to welcome new partners who share our values and wish to combine expertise to create meaningful impact.