Interdisciplinary initiative committed to enhancing livable conditions for human and more-than-human life in urban environments
We reimagine environmental engagement through collective practices and storytelling
that invite and empower meaningful action.
We are at the beginning of this journey, and we invite you to seed air with us.
How to seed air?
Our actions emerge from stories we pass down through generations and the experiences we carry of the worlds around us. When a narrative shifts, new possibilities take root. Dust, often dismissed as nuisance or waste, hold multitudes of life, no less complex than our own human bodies. It carries pollen, bacteria, viruses, spores, and human and nonhuman debris, among many others. Dust is not a singular mass — it never travels alone. It is longing to be in relation. Therefore, the plural form matters: Dusts.
SEMBRAR AIRE cultivates new narratives that are committed to restoryation: the weaving together of story and restoration. A practice inspired by the work of the ecologist Robin Wall Kimmerer. By reshaping how we define air, particles, and urban ecologies, we begin to change how we act.
SEMBRAR AIRE brings together NGOs, grassroots associations, artists, and interdisciplinary practitioners whose work inspires, holds desire and passion for shared life and co-creation.
Through the exchange of resources, knowledge and strategies, we create space for local complexities while finding solutions that can be implemented worldwide. Like sand composed of valuable minerals that travel each year from the Sahara to fertilize the Amazon rainforest, we begin small so our actions can travel further, last and multiply.
Alongside convening researchers, practitioners, and community actors, the project’s website serves as a platform for artists and interdisciplinary researchers working on the atmosphere and the urban environment. Additionally, the website functions as an archive and distributes open-access tools and DIY practices for citizen science.
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SEMBRAR AIRE is dedicated to Carlos Machado, who tirelessly nurtures and plants mangrove trees on Isla Grande, Colombia. His commitment to giving back what nature provides—breathable air, clean water, and a thriving ecosystem—inspired our foundation.
SEMBRAR AIRE began during the Cité internationale des arts residency program In situ 2025-2026 in Paris, in partnership with the Fondation Carasso.
Founded by Beatrice Zaidenberg
In collaboration with Adam Hudec
SEMBRAR AIRE is part of the Dusts Institute. Since 2021, the Dusts Institute has explored the urban environment by turning invisible actors (airborne particles and microorganisms) into protagonists.
Through interactive installations, public walks, art and architecture projects, the Dusts Institute engages diverse audiences and inspires action to address current environemntal crises.