Art for Artemis: Chris and Markus

Today’s Art for Artemis piece (the penultimate one!) is from Chris Handberg and Markus Aebersold from the Institut Kunst HGK in Basel, Switzerland:

What school are you studying at and what degree?

We both did our bachelor’s in fine arts at the Institut Kunst HGK in Basel where Chris is now working as a technical assistant while Markus is starting his Master of fine arts in sound arts at CAP in Bern.

Tell us about the technique used to make your Art for Artemis piece

Our work “A Book for All and None” started out with wanting to mix the digital and the organic. Here we were both interested in the mixture of the wet silicone and the electronics but also the “skin” that got to be afterwards – which is what you see in the photography – a silicon “skin” or imprint of a circuit board. In the end the photography fascinated us because distance seemed to dissolve – nanometres look like kilometres and the skin itself gets to be planetary.

What inspired you to make the artwork and who are your inspirations in general?

This is a specifically difficult question. We are both big (science) fiction fans and this piece arose while working on a bigger exhibition here in Basel where one of the main topics were AI or other agency in general. Sources of inspiration are all around us – architecture, nature, light, sounds, sensory experiences but maybe it’s not wrong to say that our main interest is “other agency” in general – the humans, the planets, the systems, the internets etc.

Do you have any thoughts to share about the Moon and human spaceflight?

We believe that the Moon and the longing for the sky in general is one the things that keeps us moving forward – for better or for worse. That we are inquisitive and try to learn more about where we come from and where we are going is great, but we also believe that we as a species should reflect on where we are now and how we can keep on staying here – to explore the universe should be an act of education, not of escape.

Anything else you would like to add…