Ecdysis
03.11.2023 - 16.12.2023 ELEKTRA GALLERY
Montreal, Quebec (CA)
Laura Colmenares Guerra is a Colombian artist based in Brussels, working with installation, sculpture & digital narratives in the field of 3D (animation, Virtual Reality and 3D printing).
Laura explores the intricate relationships between contemporary Western societies and the natural world, encompassing ecosystems, the environment, and all living beings. Her artworks pivot around a profound exploration of the intersection between these domains, leading her to create immersive settings that relate to the politics of landscape and the notions of territory. She explores the constructions of the concepts of nature, natural and language as a foundation medium for reality.
ECDYSIS
Laura Colmenares Guerra & Jana Irmert
Ecdysis is the natural process through which reptiles and insects moult, shedding their old skin or exoskeleton multiple times during their lifecycles. In this animated piece, a slow-moving camera meanders through a 3D reproduction of the Amazon Rainforest's topography, creating an abstract fluidity that simultaneously evokes a profound sense of vastness and the outstanding likeness to the texture of an animal's skin.
Upon closer examination, the intricacies of the Amazon basin's topography reveal an uncanny resemblance to the skin of a living, colossal creature. Indeed, with its rich diversity of river ecosystems and rainforests, the Amazon can be envisioned as an immense and interconnected organism.
The animation was developed using the 3D reproduction of the Amazon basin's topography, created within the framework of the Ríos Trilogy project.
The sound composition was made entirely from field recordings in the Amazon using hydrophones and ultrasound recordings. Through various processing methods, the sound elements are extracted from the dense jungle environments and transformed into melodic formations and rhythmic patterns.
Credits: Laura Colmenares Guerra (3D animation) & Jana Irmert (field recordings and sound composition)
Ríos Trilogy in CAPTURE#2
23.09.2023 - 14.01.2024 Le Pavillon
Namur (B)
The Ríos Trilogy by Laura Colmenares Guerra is an extensive project consisting of three chapters exploring the Amazon Basin from local and global perspectives. It offers a perspective on the region that aims to understand how people within traditional Western thinking relate to Amazonia. Through different approaches, the Trilogy attempts to understand the meanings and definitions attributed to this territory. It also sheds light on the history of colonisation and how it has impacted Amazonia, providing insights into the current socio-environmental threats facing the region.
The Ríos Trilogy is composed of three chapters:
CHAPTER N.1: RIVERS // AMAZONIA GEO-LINGUISTICS
Interactive, experimental research tool that allows mapping information related to the Amazons Rainforest on social media.
CHAPTER N.2: SPECULATIVE CARTOGRAPHIES
21 ceramic 3D printed speculative cartographies emerging from the digital hybridisation process of Amazonia-related data and the actual topography of the Amazon basin.
CHAPTER N.3: R€¥€R$€
Virtual Reality (VR 30') piece that underlines the existing tensions where human, cultural and environmental aspects rub with power, economics and multinational interests in a context of climate stress.
CAPTURE #2 is the second in a series of exhibitions devised by the KIKK to showcase the diversity and creativity of the digital arts in Belgium. The exhibition presents recent projects by artists who all use new technologies to capture the world in their own way.
Curator: Marie du Chastel
ECHOES FROM THE FUTURE
29.06.2023 - 27.08.2023 Virtual exhibition
MacKenzie Art Gallery, Regina (Saskatchewan, Canada)
Disruptive human activity continues to threaten the Earth's ecological balances, eradicating biodiversity, and our planet’s shared resources. This digital exhibition highlights artists working across diverse media to preserve nature, reveal environmental devastation, and speculate on future life forms. Curator Tina Sauerlaender (peer to space) presents artists Aviv Benn (ISR/UK), Laura Colmenares Guerra (COL/BE), Reiner Maria Matysik (DE), Sarah Oh-Mock (DE), Bianca Shonee Arroyo-Kreimes (CAN), Sabrina Ratté (CAN), Tamiko Thiel (US/DE) in an immersive online exhibition. Echoes from the Future renders current environmental issues visible in virtual reality, inviting audiences into an immersive alternative future for hybrid lifeforms.
RÍOS TRILOGY
11.05.2023 - 11.06.2023 KULT XL Ateliers, Rue Wiertz 23
1050 Brussels (B)
The Ríos Trilogy by Laura Colmenares Guerra is an extensive project consisting of three chapters exploring the Amazon Basin from local and global perspectives. It offers a perspective on the region that aims to understand how people within traditional Western thinking relate to Amazonia. Through different approaches, the Trilogy attempts to understand the meanings and definitions attributed to this territory. It also sheds light on the history of colonisation and how it has impacted Amazonia, providing insights into the current socio-environmental threats facing the region.
The Ríos Trilogy is composed of three chapters:
CHAPTER N.1: RIVERS // AMAZONIA GEO-LINGUISTICS
Interactive, experimental research tool that allows mapping information related to the Amazons Rainforest on social media.
CHAPTER N.2: SPECULATIVE CARTOGRAPHIES
21 ceramic 3D printed speculative cartographies emerging from the digital hybridisation process of Amazonia-related data and the actual topography of the Amazon basin.
CHAPTER N.3.: R€¥€R$€
Virtual Reality (VR 30') piece that underlines the existing tensions where human, cultural and environmental aspects rub with power, economics and multinational interests in a context of climate stress.
Vernissage Thursday 11 May from 18:00
Opening hours
Wednesday to Sunday
14:00 - 19:00
Please note that R€¥€R$€ is 30 min. VR piece.
To make sure you can experience it, please book your time slot.
Reservations
Residency at Labverde
01.09.2022 - 10.09.2022 Labverde
Amazon Rainforest, Brazil
Laura Colmenares Guerra has been selected to participate Labverde - Arts Immersion Program in the Amazon.
Laura will be working on 360º cinematic images for a VR project that's currently under production.
RE/VERSE
02.06.2022 Work in progress
Brussels (B)
Laura Colmenares Guerra is working on RE/VERSE, the 3rd chapter of the Ríos Trilogy.
RE/VERSE is a Virtual Reality (VR) piece that deepens into the complex situation of Amazonia: The ancestral indigenous populations and the biome of the Rainforest are endangered by the extractive practices operating in the region and the commercialisation of commodities distributed to the rest of the world.
RE/VERSE is conceived to generate a VR experience that underlines the tensions present in the territory by the pressure between the local and global perspectives. Where human, cultural and environmental aspects rub with power, economics and multinational interests in a context of climate stress in which the importance of preserving this unique ecosystem is vital for the survival of the current life on Earth.
Ríos Trilogy
- Chapter I: RIVERS // AMAZONIA geo-linguistics online application
- Chapter II: RÍOS // sculpture series based on the nineteen major sub-basins of the amazons
- Chapter III: RE/VERSE - VR
Land/scape N.1 in F.A.S.T /// Femmes Arts Sciences Technologies
11.03.2022 - 06.03.2022 U.L.B - Université Libre de Bruxelles
High Voltage Laboratory of the Ecole Polytechnique de Bruxelles, Brussels (B)
Ohme invites you to F.A.S.T. Femmes Arts Sciences Technologies, an exhibition shedding light , from an historical and artistic points of view, on the invisibilization of women in the history of art, science and technology.
Land/scape N.1 by Laura Colmenares Guerra is the first of a series of installations/sculptures, based on ongoing research that deals with the notion of landscape in relation to the Western conceptions of nature and natural. The series explores how these geopolitical concepts are found in the periphery of what we consider artificial structures or conceived by the Human. The notion of nature that arises from the relationship between aesthetics and geography involves a narrative constructed both visually and linguistically. Both logics, the representation and the categorization of the world, correspond to a utilitarian ethic. They encode, categorize a visual order and generate hierarchy.
The strategy of framing material reality transforms the environment into a mental structure through which the subject in the West establishes its relationship with the cosmos. The notion of landscape cannot be reduced to its physical reality, or to the natural sceneries it represents; it is actually extra – natural, it conveys the particular relationship between society and its environment.
HACK-À-DEUX
19.10.2021 - 20.10.2021 BOZAR
Brussels (B)
During a two days symposium taking place at Bozar, we invite you to focus on the future of Artificial Intelligence and its impact on our living environment, cities, communities, and culture – a future in which AI will become “our nearest neighbour”. Curated by Jurij Krpan and Pau Waelder, this event will bring together researchers, entrepreneurs, creatives and artists, who will share their expertise on AI in Europe, addressing topics such as AI and creativity in the arts, and the future of living with AI.
Over the two days of the conference, we will host in parallel, and for the first time at Bozar, a hackathon entitled “Hack-à-deux”, on the theme Living with AI, our nearest neighbour. The hackathon is a creative marathon, in which two artists will be paired with three researchers, scientists, engineers or curators to answer a specific challenge dealing with the future of our life with AI in no more than 48 hours. The results of the hackathon will be presented to the public at the end of the symposium during the last panel.
“Hack-à-deux” with Dries Depoorter, Laura Colmenares Guerra, Alex Verhaest, Bohdana Kohorod, Kristjan Jansen and Guillem Alenyà.
Full programme & tickets for Day 1
https://www.bozar.be/en/calendar/future-living-day-1
Full programme & tickets for Day 2
https://www.bozar.be/en/calendar/future-living-day-2
Not able to come to Brussels on 19 + 20 Oct.’21?
We will be live-streaming the symposium via Zoom.
Please register in advance to obtain the Zoom-link.
Registration for the live-streaming of Day 1:
https://bit.ly/TFOL-Zoom-Day1
Registration for the live-streaming of Day 2:
https://bit.ly/TFOL-Zoom-Day2
Find out more about the Future of Living and start interacting with the AI.
https://www.thefutureofliving.eu/
Lagunas & Rios Trilogy
08.09.2021 - 19.09.2021 Scopitone 2021
Stereolux, Nantes (FR)
Lagunas is a fictional & interactive installation, a triptych between memory, death, and water. Prehistoric landscapes are the scenario for the chronicles of a drowning man, disclosing the rarity of water on Planet Earth.
Lagunas is dark, still, and somber. Silent landscapes, dying fish, the water of a thick dark lake, seaweed and mud cover the depths. Below the surface, a man drowns. From the abyss, archaic rocks are attracted by magnetic forces. Drilling machines emerge, turning between the cliffs, intercepting the stones in levitation and destroying the rocks, which fall back into the water. The abandoned body of the man, receives the impacts of the stones, wakes up, strives to save his life, and loses consciousness...
The drilling machines embody the hydraulic fracturing techniques used to extract fossils fuels from the shale rock of the Earth. The water contamination process consequence of the hydraulic rupture is visualized from close-up animations to larger-scale images where the fracking fluid travels through the pipelines reaching the groundwater. High-pressure impulsions cause the nearby shale rock to crack, creating fissures where fuels flow into the surface of the Earth, while rests of toxic fluids contaminate the water of the subsoil of the Earth.
Three water valves are used in Lagunas as interactive devices. When the water valves are rotated, image and sound are activated. Further than interacting with image and sound events, the level/amount of interaction of the participants is continuously analyzed. An interactive scenario adapts to the behavior of the spectators, allowing variations and deviations on the fictional order. The water tabs are used all along the experience as triggers & controllers for the interactive scenario of the installation.
The lakes and mountain landscapes have been shoot in Colombia, in the «Chingaza Natural National Park», a natural reserve located in the Eastern Cordillera of the Andes, in the northeast of Bogotá. The underwater images were filmed in a lake in the Netherlands, using a high-speed cinema camera (Phantom-Flex) and shoot at 300fps. The landscapes & underwater images are composited with 3D (CGI) generated images.
The Ríos Trilogy is an installation project based on the Amazon Rainforest territory1, understood from a local and global perspective. The project explores the relationship between language and the construction and definitions of territory (from the western perspective). The trilogy proposes a lecture of Amazonia based on observation and analysis of metadata - hashtags from social media2, combined with actual geo-reference data related to socio-environmental threats the territory undergoes.
Ríos explores visual representations, speculative cartographies that rise from the process of hybridisation of Amazonia related data.
Ríos - CHAPTER I: Rivers // Amazonia Geo-linguistics is an experimental research tool that allows mapping information related to the Amazons Rainforest on social media (currently only Twitter). We designed a tool to facilitate analysis and visualisation of semantics used in Twitter in an attempt to comprehend how western societies relate to the complex situation of the Amazons basin. The study wishes to introduce possible perspectives that spotlight the behaviour and conditioning of human societies that use social media and its semantic structures to communicate.
With a humble and empirical approach, we grasp the immense mass of data emerging from Twitter, the hashtags, hashtags co-occurrences and the information contained in the messages where the hashtags are included. This information is continuously archived on a database. We run algorithms on the database to generate statistical data.
The results of this analysis are applied to the geo-referenced marks where socio-environmental threads have been identified, performing experimental interventions on the actual topographic data of the Amazonian territory.
Ríos - CHAPTER II: RÍOS // sculpture series proposes a series of speculative cartographies that rise from a digital process of hybridisation of Amazonia related data. The cartographical work produced in Ríos results in a series of nineteen sculptures. Each sculpture is based on topographic data from a territory delimited by the hydrological sub-basins forming the extensive Amazonian basin and the major tributary rivers nourishing the Amazons River:
Japurá-Caquetá / Iça-Putumayo + Napo + Nanay / Marañon + Huallaga / Javari + Jutaí / Ucayali / Juruá / Purus + Tefé / Madre de Díos + Beni / Mamoré + Guaporé / Madeira + Aripuanã / Juruena + São Manoel + Abacaxis + Tapajós / Iriri + Xingu / Araguaia / Tocantins / Mearim / Trombetas + Jari / Branco / Negro / Amazon floodplain
RIOS // CAQUETÁ - JAPURÁ & JURUÁ in 'Code is Law'
09.01.2021 - 28.02.2021 CENTRE WALLONIE BRUXELLES
Paris (F)
Ríos is a series of sculptures based on the topography of the Amazon Basin; they explore the relationship between language, specifically in social media, and the construction of territory in visual, symbolic and conceptual terms. The project introduces a reading of the Amazons basin’s topography based on observation and analysis of metadata - hashtags from social media, in combination with geo-referenced information related to socio-environmental issues associated with the basin’s territory.
Ríos proposes a series of speculative cartographies that rise from a digital process of hybridisation of Amazonia related data. The cartographical work produced in Ríos materializes as a series of thirteen sculptures. Each sculpture is based on topographic data from a territory delimited by the principal subbasins conforming the extensive Amazonian basin and by the main tributary rivers feeding the Amazons River: Tocantins, Xingu, Tapajós, Madeira, Purus, Ucayali, Marañón, Napo, Putumayo -Içá, Caquetá -Japurá, Juruá, Negro, Trombetas.
Research
On-line application
Artworks
Code is Law