Landscape as Material Witness, part 2

It seems impossible to see only one thing. When I see, what I see is the relation between myself and what I’m looking at.

By looking, I’m bringing the world closer and within my reach.

I know that, since I can see, I can also be seen.

When I hit the record button to capture an imagery, what I see starts to exist.

For a week, I was blissful to be part of an incredible group of ten artists and researchers, led by Susan Schuppli, on a research trip to the spectacular natural, cultural, and industrial landscape of Hardanger. We thought, talked, discussed, and presented, did field work, delved into the hostile and wet weather conditions in Bondhusdalen in search for a glimpse of the glacier, and visited the impressive Tyssedal power plant (now a museum), in the second part of the workshop Landscape as Material Witness hosted by BEK - Bergen Centre for Electronic Arts. The workshop was looking at how visual traces in a landscape can be read, and how these traces can function as witnesses of ongoing processes like destruction of nature, climate changes, or political and economic transformations.

Bondhusbrea glacier hidden in white, rainy clouds.

Birch trees with outlandish turquoise lichen.

Field work.

Recording low frequency sounds from the earth and other surrounding magnetic fields.

Sun print exposing in the rain; reflection of light coming all the way from the glacier.

Tyssedal power plant. Pipelines installed by hand running far down the mountainside.

Matching the control room.