#sandmotor

I would like to explore what can be revealed of their past, to which animals they belonged, and somehow experience their origins. This leads me to suggest an experiment, to see if any taste can still be teased from these bones after such a long time? Is it possible to use ingredients of 35 thousand years old? Is it possible to taste the last Ice Age?

These remnants of ancient creatures evidently present an attraction to a certain type of elderly males readily identifiable by a non-linear walking pattern and the presence of some kind of bag. It's a thouroughly despiriting sight to behold. Moving from one attractor to another they mimic the 'brownian motion' of foraging coastbirds and absolutely comb the damned place from one end to the other. Unwittingly a novel fossil-searcher becomes part of a complex web of competition.

The first step is to check the Sandmotor webpage for accurate timing of the tides. To be sure you go at least an hour before low tide. Walking to the coastline the place seems deserted, until you reach over the last ridge of sand. Thats when your hart sinks. Looking down to the edge of the water at least two or three of these grey menaces already actively scanning the place. Now your only option is finding areas they haven't been scuttling around yet. Moving around fast desperate to find an end to the bloody footsteps.

The research methodologies applied to analyze the emergent island also reflect this ambition for openness. Scientists have exposed their research subjects and instruments to various levels of the onslaught that is the general public. Fragile wooden sticks marking out a research-area may be the only line of defense against the more sizable passers-by such as quads, kitebuggies, and the occasional teenage joyrider. Human pressures are taken as a given on the Sandmotor, both in terms of ecosystem dynamics and research conditions. The place is covered by a rich tapestry of tracks marking out various patterns of human activity. It's striking to see researchers driving straight through the fieldwork of others. At some scales anthropogenic markings almost fully erode the environmental exchanges. This level of openness must be challenging to research. Perhaps that is why indigenous research methods preclude full objectivity, because there are always particulars, disturbances and contributing factors.

Philosopher and critical theorist Timothy Morton coined the term “hyperobject" to describe objects so massively distributed in time and space that they transcend localization, like global warming or radioactive plutonium. To the mammoths, rhinos and other extinct megafauna that now lie scrambled all over the motor it probably would feel like that. It's a 4 million ton monster that slowly self-organizes like aggregate architectures, carrying an array of sensor-technology on its back. Excited scientists admit they aren't quite sure what its up to.. The semi-aquatic research arena with it's public sculpture garden of data harvesting devices represents a brave effort by the scientific community towards a shared space. Hopefully its reflected in the methodologies applied by us artists.