Čuoikkariššu / Mosquito Shower explores the tension between discomfort and coexistence through the itchy sound of mosquitoes, tiny beings with an outsized ecological role in Arctic ecosystems.
Čuoikkariššu / Mosquito Shower invites audiences to rethink mosquitoes and their sounds not as nuisances, but as vital participants in a dense web of relations linking humans, multispecies communities and environmental change.
Changes in sonic environments often accompany — and sometimes even precede — changes in the landscape. In fragile Arctic ecologies, even the smallest shifts matter. Mosquitoes play essential roles: they support food webs, influence animal movement, and contribute to the balance of tundra life.
Today, the Arctic is warming rapidly. Mosquitoes are appearing earlier in the year, their life cycles are changing, and new species are moving north. While scientists are still learning how these transformations will affect ecosystems and biodiversity, Indigenous ecological knowledge offers insights grounded in long-term coexistence and close attention even to microscopic entanglements.
In the European Arctic, the Sámi have come to live with mosquitoes as part of a broader network of care across all Earth beings. Attending closely to their presence also means attending to their sound, and the stinging discomfort we commonly associate to these insect’s buzzing for some Sámi may be heard as a beautiful joik melody.