Participation in linear and interactive documentaries towards Human-Nature interaction

Urban culture has encouraged participatory art practices that focused on human interaction and social contexts. At the same time, urbanization has induced a disconnection between Human-Nature interaction and the development of mental models detached from complex social-ecological systems and their sustainability. This article is part of a PhD research relating Digital and Interactive Arts with Ecology and Psychology. Our aim is to investigate participation in documentary film production and explore it as a participatory artistic medium to foster critical thinking towards Sustainability. Hereof, in this article we set the grassroots from which our research will evolve. We first analyse participation in the process of filmmaking, through the engagement of the subject-participant in documentary creation and production both in linear films and in i-Docs (interactive and immersive documentaries). We then associate the speech of these subject-participants to mental models concept. Next, we introduce the sustainability principles that will guide our investigation in urban social-ecological contexts and set some inspirations raised by previous artistic practices. We then discuss the intersections between aspects of participation in documentary films with mental models and sustainability to finally set out interrogations and possibilities for future artistic explorations that ponder on participation, authorship, technology, cognitive dimensions, social-ecological systems and dissemination towards sustainability.