SUMMER 2012_ALIEN ENCOUNTERS
_ROSWELL CRASH SITE TO BURNING MAN FESTIVAL

Projects

• High Strange: Graphic novel
• Unknown Fields Summer 2012 Alien Encounters Expedition: Conspiracy Theorists interview showreel

Unknown Fields is a nomadic studio that throws open the doors of the AA and sets off on an annual expedition to the ends of the earth exploring unreal and forgotten landscapes, alien terrains and obsolete ecologies. Each year we navigate a different global cross-section and map the complex and contradictory realities of the present as a site of strange and extraordinary futures. You will be both visionaries and reporters, part documentarian and part science-fiction soothsayers as the otherworldly sites we encounter will afford us a distanced viewpoint from which to survey the consequences of emerging environmental and technological scenarios.

This year the Division will be heading off on a reconnaissance road trip to chronicle a series of extraterrestrial encounters from the borderlands, black sites, military outposts and folkloric landscapes of the United States. From the ‘illegal aliens’ of the New Mexico border towns we will head north exploring territories of negotiation and conflict, zones of transgression, suspicion and speculation. We will rumble along the UFO highway, past the mythic territories of Area 51, listening to tall tales from conspiracy theorists amidst the sonic booms crackling in the quiet desert air. We will visit covert military test sites and the alien technologies of the aeronautics industry as we shape our own experimental craft to launch in the skies above the psychedelic community of the Burning Man Festival, where our journey ends. By the bonfires we will examine the mysteries and conspiracies that surround what lies off the map, off-grid and below the radar as we propose new truths and expose alternative fictions.

Joining us on our travels was a troupe of collaborators from the worlds of technology, science and fiction including UFOologist, folklorist and author Mark Pilkington, Futurist Stuart Candy, Film maker Jonathan Gales and photographer Christina Seely. Together we formed a travelling circus of research visits, field reportage, rolling discussions and impromptu tutorials that are being chronicled in a publication and travelling exhibition. Throughout our journey the Division identifies opportunities for tactical intervention and speculative invention as we examine the unknown fields between truth and fiction.

‘To be the first to enter the cosmos, to engage, single-handed, in an unprecedented duel with nature-could one dream of anything more.’ Yuri Gagarin

Leaders: Liam Young and Kate Davies

High Strange: Graphic Novel
Unknown Fields Weapons of Fiction Division_Summer 2012_Roswell to Burning Man 37°15'42.9"N 115°48'03.7"W

Buy Unknown Fields Graphic Novel High Strange here

 

High Strange is a graphic novel developed in response to the material Unknown Fields collected and the text written along Unknonw Fields' journey through the military black sites of the United States. All dialogue is taken from real interviews conducted with whistle-blowers, UFO researchers, local characters and military personnel. Collaged material is gathered en-route from declassified dossiers, alien enthusiast book stores, roadside gift shops and new age media. Unknown Fields embedded graphic novelist Kristian Donaldson operates on tour like a court room illustrator to visualise the conversations, sightings and first-hand accounts from the field. High Strange is a new conspiracy theory, stitched together from the stories unearthed in the shadowlands of the United States. It is a portrait of a landscape as a factory of fictions. A form of weaponised folklore. A territory that can be only understood by examining the stories the world tells about it.

Unknown Fields Summer 2012 Alien Encounters Expedition: Conspiracy Theorists interview showreel
Unknown Fields High Strange Department_Summer 2012_Roswell to Burning Man 37°15'42.9"N 115°48'03.7"W

The Unknown FIelds DIvision is a nomadic research studio that travels to the ends of the earth exploring emerging relationships between landscape and technology. This year the Division headed off on a reconnaissance road trip to chronicle a series of extraterrestrial encounters from the borderlands, black sites, military outposts and folkloric landscapes of the United States. From the ‘illegal aliens’ of the New Mexico border towns the division headed north exploring territories of negotiation and conflict, zones of transgression, suspicion and speculation. Rumbling along the UFO highway, past the mythic territories of Area 51, the division recorded tall tales from conspiracy theorists, retired military, UFO abductees and extraterrestrial researchers. These fictions from the desert form a portrait of a landscape only visible through the stories people tell about it. Footage is shot and edited by Jonathan Gales.