PЯОТO-ALIEИ PЯOJECT

Interested in discussing and exploring the intermingling of non-human agency, degrees of aliveness and alien life, we started the PЯОТO-ALIEИ PЯOJECT (PЯОТO-A) in 2019. Through this project, we investigate the synthesis and use of extraterrestrial organic matter (ETOM) as an active medium for artistic purposes. We particularly focus on the morphogenetic tendencies and the non-linear behaviour of extraterrestrial material assemblages in non-terrestrial, alien environments.

Largely, this project is a framework, a multi-disciplinary laboratory of ideas and experiments at the intersection of astrobiology, chemistry and media art. Our aim is to use ETOM to grow soft, kinetic and autonomous agents: intelligent ʻothersʼ that thrive and avoid equilibrium on non-terrestrial environments – a new type of alien material agency, yet unknown to humankind.

C R E D I T S
Project team – Juan M. Castro, Akihiro Kubota and Taro Toyota.

In collaboration with – The Institute of Advanced Media Arts and Sciences (IAMAS); Department of Information Design, Tama Art University; and The Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, The University of Tokyo.

WORKS

FORMATA | 2020 – 2022

Non-terrestrial entities in a waterless mini-planet

PUBLICATIONS

FORMATA

Castro, J. M., Kubota, A., & Toyota, T. (2024). KOBAI 7, 37-51.

Today, at a time when our anthropogenic impact and material culture are expanding beyond Earth, what would it mean ontologically to experience performative alien matter? FORMATA is a multi-sensory art installation, featuring lively and autonomous blobs within an experimental reactor crafted to simulate an alien world with liquid formamide.

What is it like to be an alien

Kubota, A., (2023). IAMAS Journal Vol.14, 143-146.

Alien Media and Extraterrestrial Otherness

Castro, J. M., (2023). IAMAS Journal Vol.14, 150-156.

In light of the signs of anthropocentrism still present in the concept of life, it is necessary, in the name of the living, to allow life to become something other than it is traditionally assumed to be. Alien media and a wider horizon of life signs, as opposed to familiar biosignatures and technosignatures, could allow us to bring in not only those excluded from being but also the entire realm of the nonhuman and non-terrestrial agencies.

Non-terrestrial Material Agency

Castro, J. M., & Kubota. A (2020). Performance Research 25 (3), 50-55

Extraterrestrial organic matter embodies the ‘other’, the unknown, alien life and a broader allocation of agency; it is loaded with philosophical, ontological and ethical considerations. As part of the Proto-A Project, we have focused on ETOM as an optimal substance to question the geocentric and anthropocentric mind-set intrinsic to our utilitarian understanding of matter.