Post-Atmosphere

The Otherworld Art Gallery 0.1.2 was an exhibition of artworks held in April 2021 by Svima,1 an architecture and art studio in Toronto. Digitally situated on Mars, the exhibit was displayed online in four 3-D inflatable structures on extraterrestrial grounds. It drew on themes of biomorphism, avant-garde architecture, the relationship between organisms and the environment, astrobiology, and ecological memory. The gallery was launched with a party in an online social platform that allowed remote participants, who were encouraged to browse the artworks by clicking through 360-degree scenes, to gather in a spatial virtual environment where they could experience the artworks together. The selected artworks shed new light on familiar forms permitted by earth’s atmosphere; they are presented in situ as artifacts and memories, displaced from worldly interiors and pandemic realities. Some pieces explore an apocalyptic vision in which livable surfaces require protection from a hostile atmosphere, forcing superstructures to create their own separated macroclimates to survive. A few hand-drawn works deconstruct the invisible lattice that exists behind the smooth shapes rendered in the pieces shown on screen: the triangular polygon mesh, one of the oldest and fastest forms of geometric representation in computer graphics. Several works explore memories of earth’s islands, such as Vancouver and Hong Kong, using surrealist language to contemplate the detritus of human production and industrial remains. Presented together, the artworks culminate in a question: In a post-atmosphere world, what would endure?