In 1977, NASA launched Voyager 1 & 2 on a historic journey into deep space. Affixed to each spacecraft was a phonograph record as a message to possible extra-terrestrial civilizations, or future humans that might encounter it in some distant space and time. Each record contained images, audio recordings, music from our planet, and greetings in almost sixty human languages selected to portray the diversity of life on earth. Since these spacecrafts could last billions of years, these circular time capsules could one day be the only traces of human civilization.

Inspired by these records, we conceptualized “ABSOLUT SPACE” as a way to explore these fragments of information now floating somewhere in the far reaches of interstellar space to instigate a dialog on how we would construct an image of earth and create an experience to reflect on how we would produce our own time capsule for the future.

Absolut Space

ROOM 1

Video Projection, Continuous Loop

Abstract Animated Sequence inspired by the ABSOLUT Silhouette

Interstellar Messages

ROOM 2

Video Projection, Continuous Loop

What you are seeing are a collection of spoken greetings in 55 languages encoded onto the voyager records that have been translated into English. They begin with Akkadian, which was spoken about six thousand years ago, and end with Wu, a modern Chinese dialect.

While creating these messages, the speakers were given no instructions on what to say other than that it was to be a greeting to any being that might encounter the spacecraft as it journeyed through interstellar space and that it must be brief.

These greetings now float around 18 Billion KM away from earth in the space between the stars well beyond our solar system. It will be forty thousand years before they make a close approach to any other planetary system

View of Mars 1

ROOM 3

Video Projection, Continuous Loop

Video projected on the wall of a Woman Looking at Mars that the audience can view through a tiny rectangular hole in the tunnel.

View of Mars 2

ROOM 4

Sculpture

Object Suspended in the room that the audience can view through a tiny rectangular hole in the tunnel. This was placed opposite Room 3, which shows a woman looking at this object as seen on the reflection on her sunglasses.

Sounds of Earth

ROOM 5

6 Hanging Headphones Playing Sounds from the Voyager Records, Continuous Loop

What you are listening to are sounds electronically placed on voyager 1 & 2 spacecrafts as part of NASA’s attempt to create a soundscape of planet earth.

LIST OF SOUNDS:

Volcanoes, Earthquake, Thunder; Mud Pots; Wind, Rain, Surf; Crickets, Frogs; Birds, Hyena, Elephant; Chimpanzee; Wild Dog; Footsteps, Heartbeat, Laughter; Fire, Speech; The First Tools; Tame Dog; Herding Sheep, Blacksmith, Sawing; Tractor, Riveter; Morse Code, Ships; Horse and Cart; Train; Tractor, Bus, Auto; F-111 Flyby, Saturn 5 Lift-off; Kiss, Mother and Child; Life Signs, Pulsar

These sounds now float around 18 Billion KM away from earth in the space between the stars well beyond our solar system. It will be forty thousand years before they make a close approach to any other planetary system.

What Messages Would You Send?

ROOM 6

Interactive Wall

Viewers are invited to imagine and write a message they would send into outer space