Chajnantor Place of Departure
Ars Electronica Festival 2021 - Part of Atacama Garden: ALMA Observatory + Fundación Mustakis
As part of the internationally acclaimed Ars Electronica Festival — a place where art, technology and science collide — Elise Guillaume was invited by artist Samuel Domínguez to collaborate on a commissioned video based on the Chajnantor plateau; the place where ALMA Observatory is located in the Atacama Desert in the north of Chile.
Created with pre-recorded footage (courtesy of ALMA), the video immerses the audience into the bleak landscape of Atacama. By combining images of the Desert and Mars together through digital techniques, the work seeks to question our relationship with nature within the context of the digital revolution.
The narration was written collaboratively between Guillaume, Domínguez, and a text-based artificial intelligence algorithm. Finally, the video uses a musical interpretation composed by Olaf Peña Pastene. It makes use of data from the Orion Constellation obtained by astronomer Ricardo Finger.
The video was officially released on September 8th, 2021, during the Ars Electronica Festival 2021 online here: ars.electronica.art/newdigitaldeal/en/chajnantor/
Credits:
Samuel Domínguez (CL/GB) – artist / Elise Guillaume (BE/GB) – filmmaker / Olaff Peña Pastene (CL/ES) – music and sound / Tamara Contreras Landeros (CL) – voiceover / Francisca Bascuñán (CL) – voice studio recording