alien_as

In the very beginning of this project, I noticed that we think of aliens as superior species that are coming to our planet, to destroy and to colonise, to exploit Earth's resources. Pop culture and science fiction present aliens and extraterrestial beings as dangerous and hostile (Alien, Predator, Mars Attacks), or intelligent and advanced on many levels (Contact, Close Encounters of the Third Kind). Not all media show them this way, and alien beings are shown to parter up with human species (Futurama, Star Wars, Star Trek).

Now being aware of this current narrative, I wondered if alien can be something that already resides inside us. Maybe they are closer than we think.

When defining the alien for my project, I came to multiple conclusions and I build my experiments around those ideas.

Each idea (or rather, definition) is linked to a specific context: historical, social, psychological etc.

Alien can be divided into two categories: external and internal (being). External refers to an UFO, extraterrestial being, another species. An internal alien refers to something that resides inside of us, like soul or suppressed mind.

THE SUPERIOR SPECIES
THE (INTER)NATIONAL TRAUMA
THE DISTRACTION
THE TECHNOLOGY / A.I.
THE OTHER / OTHERNESS

THE INACCESSIBLE
THE SUPPRESSED MIND
THE UNKNOWN
THE SOUL
THE SPIRIT
THE INTERDIMENSIONAL EXTENSION OF HUMANS
THE NEW ARCHETYPE OF COLLECTIVE CONSCIOUSNESS

A L I E N S & C O N T E X T S

adopt a constellation

the 12 bronze statues represent the signs of the zodiac and were made in 1990 by visual artist toon slegers

By adopting an image you support space expo in carrying out its aducative target creations

inquire at our counter for the possibilities

S C I E N C E . F I C T I O N - A J O U R N E Y TO THE U N K N O W N @ K U N S T H A L

SCIENCE FICTION - A JOURNEY TO THE UNKNOWN @KUNSTHAL, ROTTERDAM NL

The exhibition at Kunsthal showcased comic books, books, novels, postcards, movie clips and props from famous science fiction stories.

Questions of space always surface questions about life on other planets.

The golden age of science fiction was in 1950s,
during the Cold War era.

Sci-fi is about the future, and two worlds are presented: Utopia and Dystopia. Ironically, utopia doesnt exist, so the world-view is often dystopian.

Why are they exhibiting this now? Why is this relevant?
*Space technology is being developed in fast pace, NASA is aiming for Mars, Mercury and Jupiter. Oumuamua was speculated to be the first alien probe.
*Technology has grip over our lives.
*Some sci-fi stories dont lose their magic over time, such as Star Wars, Star Trek, Alien, Ghost in the Shell, Blade Runner.
*I guess the questions of alien existance have always intrigued human species, for many reasons.
*The rise and popularity of science fiction: the Handmaid's Tale, Black Mirror.

Can A.I. and technology and singularity be considered as aliens/extraterrestials, or alien-species?

Sci-fi keyword: Tomorrow.

Russian cosmonaut-stories are reflection of inner conflicts, space is a frontier for inner reflection, rather than finding new life-forms.

SUPERIOR SPECIES
possible contexts: scifi and pop-culture
also: archeology, exoarcheology
= Intelligent, advanced being or entity, residing in space, in another galaxy. In media they are depicted as conquering species with bad intentions.

THE (INTER)NATIONAL TRAUMA
context: history+psychology
=UFO sightings are a stage/a play for something more grandiose: like a subconscous play materialised in UFO phenomena. Like Jerry Kroth argues that the Lindbergh kidnapping acted as a subconsncious interplay for the horrors of WWII.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HjWaFm9VSJk

THE DISTRACTION
context: US history-Cold War technology
= UFO sightings were at its peak during the Cold War era, 1950s and 1960s, when science/fiction literature started to gain popularity. UFOs were often seen as advanced technology, and maybe this was the case? A bad attempt at discuising advanced military technology.

Like celebrity news and reality tv today, UFOs were the form of entertainment/distraction of the 20th century.

THE TECHNOLOGY / A.I.
context: latest technology and science; robotics and ethics
= The Alien is our creation, not a separate entity living in space. Singularity creates new species, when humans+tech become intertwined and indistinguishable from one another.

THE OTHER/OTHERNESS
context: social sciences / philosophy
= Fellow human species, same same but different.
Depictions of aliens (in pop culture, scifi etc) serves actually as a metaphor for things we do not understand: which is the Other, the exotic, the different.

THE INACCESSIBLE / THE SUPPRESSED MIND / THE UNKNOWN
context: psychoanalysis, Freudian-
Also: unreality
=Drawing inspiration from Freud and Jung's theories, the alien could be indentified as the unconscious mind. What lies beyond the final frontier is scary as hell. Humans have always been scared of the unknown.

THE SOUL - context: religion - UFO religions
= Maybe there is a soul after all. Although science hasn't been able to prove its existence.

THE SPIRIT context: (new age) shamanism, mythology / unreality
= Shamans communicate between the material world and the spirit world. Maybe the spirits are the aliens?

THE INTERDIMENSIONAL EXTENSION OF HUMANS
context: new-age spirituality / unreality
= "We are immortal spiritual beings living a temporary human experience", argues Youtuber Aaron Doughty. We have come to Earth to shift the collective consciousness, however, we have forgot about ourselves during this process. It's now our job to remember who we are, and we are interdimensional beings.

THE NEW ARCHETYPE
context: Jungian psychology, psychoanalysis
= "Carl Jung understood archetypes as universal, archaic patterns and images that derive from the collective unconscious and are the psychic counterpart of instinct.[1] They are inherited potentials which are actualized when they enter consciousness as images or manifest in behavior on interaction with the outside world"