DAN MILLER
INDEX
ABOUT
2023-2024
In this video installation, Marina Otero Verzier and I explore the case of the Pacific island nation of Tuvalu — faced with the potential loss of its physical territory due to rising sea levels, the government of Tuvalu has announced a plan to become fully virtual, transferring the nation’s existence to the "cloud." We’re asking: Where is Tuvalu amidst remote capture, digitization, and landscape change? What characterizes the rhythms, resolutions, and relationships between digital geographies and “ground truth”?
Positioning, locating, and representing the territory of Tuvalu are key to the state’s linked efforts toward permanent statehood and digital nationhood — the map that describes Tuvalu’s location both delineates the extent of the state and structures the digital twin. The location of Tuvalu will be increasingly described in terms of the networks of internet and the materiality of data storage. But borders shift in a digital state, dissolving distinctions between land and sea, highlighting the frailty of territorial concepts.
The 12 minute video presents remotely sensed imagery central to Tuvalu’s coastal survey and adaptation efforts; as well as emerging digital representations of Tuvalu’s atolls, reefs, and oceanic landscapes within the metaverse. A computer works in the gallery, responding to the frequency of satellite passes over Tuvalu’s exclusive economic zone, recalculating, reconsidering, and reiterating territorial baselines in a loop.
Tools:
Link:
Editing: Manuel Correa
Soud Design: Emil Nygard Olsen
Python, QGIS, Raspberry Pi, Blender, Adobe Premiere
https://www.dissenyhub.barcelona/en/exhibition/ocean-speaks-new-ecologies-and-new-economies-seas