Worlds In Transit

in June 2012, super/collider invited a group of artists, filmmakers, astronomers, photographers, choreographers and curators to join us in the remote Swedish wilderness to witness a once-in-a-lifetime astronomical event: the transit of Venus. from our pristine vantage point amid the forests and fields, we watched as the planet Venus passed between the earth and the sun – its tiny black disk revealing the true scale of the solar system

the participants observations and work will form the basis of a publication and exhibition in London opening on 6 June 2013 – one year on from the transit. you can subscribe for updates, and we’ve posted a small selection of photos from the trip on Flickr in the meantime

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The Transit of Venus, 2012

credit

Loren Filis

☼♀ Worlds in Transit exhibition

© Cat Stevens

6-9 June 2013 | The Wayward Gallery | 47 Mowlem Street | London E2 9HE

last summer, we invited a group of artists, filmmakers, astronomers, photographers, choreographers and curators to journey to the remote wilderness of northern Sweden to witness a once-in-a-lifetime astronomical event: the Transit of Venus. their observations and artistic output from the expedition now form the basis of a publication and exhibition, launching in London one year on from the Transit

choreographer/artist Nissa Nishikawa filmed a site-specific performance in the forest, set to music composed by Ebe Oke. Cat Stevens and Archie McLeish will show photographs from the days surrounding the event, while filmmakers Kathryn Ferguson, Loren Filis and Fritz Stolberg used the Transit as a backdrop for new work. the exhibition will also feature artwork by Hazel France, Karima Adebibe and Rebecca Lynch

exhibition and publication launch/PV on Thursday 6 June (an east London First Thursday) with a ‘real-time’ screening of the 2012 Transit of Venus at 10:09pm. exhibition continues throughout the weekend with film screenings

Facebook event page here / images for press, blogging and publicity are available here

☼♀ click here to view all posts related to this project ☼♀

summer solstice party

sol-prob-june

Thursday 20 June 2013

as the summer nights stretch out into the small hours, we’ll be teaming up with the mighty solutionvsproblem to host a nite of solstice-fueled disco, space and balearic psych with a bit of neo sci-rave paganism thrown in for good measure

Ridley Road Market Bar | 49 Ridley Rd | London | E8 2NP

messenger

launched way back in 2004, NASA’s MESSENGER probe became the first spacecraft to enter orbit around Mercury and has since beamed back incredible images of the planet’s blisteringly hot surface, discovered ice at its shadow-shrouded poles and even snapped a family portrait of the solar system, looking back out from the centre. this nifty enhanced-colour animation shows a combination of images taken through eight of the probe’s cameras

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species of the week: Cortinarius

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our species this week is an imagined one; part of Vincent Fournier‘s new photographic art series. where previous projects saw him exploring space infrastructure, robotics and architecture, ‘Post Natural History’ is very much focused on life, but not as we know it. a new kingdom of engineered living things, creations run the gamut from pollution-detecting beetles to predator-proof owls. Cortinarius (Fungus aridus) is a fungi engineered to tolerate arid environments, created by the “injection of a genetically modified gene isolated from camel hump cells in spores. Reservoir of fatty tissue derived from lipoblasts within cap. Metabolized tissue with a yield of approx. 0.1 g of H2O for each 0.1 g of fat converted through reaction with O2 from the air”

Post Natural History is on show at acte2galerie‘s Left Bank space in Paris until 1 September 2013

gateways

Star Towers: Elysium Planitia

Star Towers: Elysium Planitia

our new series of collage works feature monolithic structures set amid distant landscapes, connecting various locations around the known universe – in this case Gusev Crater on the edge of Mars’ vast Elysium Planitia with the centre of the Milky Way galaxy via three gateways, each imparting a different arrival velocity

spring

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there are tons of photos of earth taken from space, but few as good as Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield’s recent series from the International Space Station, where he’s been living since November last year. while up there, he’s been posting photos on Twitter, answering questions from space and recording folky songs that aren’t entirely terrible. this photo from yesterday shows spring around Lake Balaton in Hungary

super/collider Icelandic expedition

Sk—gafoss

3-10 September
& 11-18 September 2013

as the sun reaches the peak of its solar activity cycle, join super/collider, scientists and like-minded explorers as we travel across Iceland in search of the Northern Lights and other natural wonders this autumn

amid the stark beauty of Iceland’s surreal landscapes, we’ll spend seven nights under the stars with the best possible chance of seeing the Aurora Borealis. in autumn 2013, the sun will reach solar maximum – making solar storms and the resulting atmospheric light shows more likely, more intense and more spectacular. if you’ve ever dreamed of seeing the Northern Lights, this is the best chance you’ll get all decade

by day, we’ll hike to towering glaciers, visit active volcanoes, search for crystals and minerals with an expert guide and explore Iceland’s amazing natural and geologic features – from erupting geysers and natural hot springs to tumbling waterfalls and icy glacial lagoons

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concrete

concrete

with the passing this week of visionary architect Paolo Soleri, I’ve been thinking about the time I spent at Arcosanti – his experimental desert settlement – last November while writing a piece for AnOther. one morning, up early to take photos with the rising sun hitting the concrete, I wandered through the empty city; home to 60 or so people but deserted at that hour, except for a bobcat which padded noiselessly past. inside the silent, sun flooded rooms and offices, Soleri’s visions of soaring arcologies hung on the walls and filled endless, carefully preserved scrolls. in one room, an architectural model of one of his hyperstructures caught the sunlight, its monumental scale lit up over the miniature landscape

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sample of the week: Malachite

Malachite

used to make green paint in ancient times, Malachite is a rich green copper carbonate hydroxide mineral with the formula Cu2CO3(OH)2. usually found deep underground, where hydrothermal fluids and water reservoirs can create Malachite stalagmites. this particular sample is from Zaire

stripes

saturn

from exquisite gemstones and the rings of Saturn to stripey tights and eye-popping prints, Patternity‘s first festival of pattern explores the enduring magnetism of stripes in all their forms. the jam-packed events programme includes workshops ranging from t-shirt printing to neuroscience, all investigating an aspect of this particular pattern

we’ve made a short film about stripes in space which will be screening on Sunday 14 April as part of science day