AEROCENE

Fly around the world, free from borders, free from fossil fuels.

 Aerocene is an interdisciplinary artistic endeavor that seeks to devise new modes of sensitivity, reactivating a common imaginary towards achieving an ethical collaboration with the atmosphere and the environment. Its activities manifest in the testing and dissemination of lighter-than-air sculptures that become buoyant only by the heat of the Sun and infrared radiation from the surface of Earth. 

In a world of  tumultuous geopolitical relations, Aerocene communicates a message of simplicity, reminding us that the air belongs to everyone and should not depend on any type of sovereignty.  

It imagines a new infrastructure, which challenges and redefines an international right to mobility, reversing the extractive approach humans have developed toward the planet and re-examining freedom of movement between countries. This could be achieved by encouraging a bottom-up, participatory approach to policy making about the air, and through the activity of international community-building carried out by the Aerocene Foundation.

FLOAT PREDICTOR

travel around the Earth
using no other resources than the sun >>

THE AEROCENE EXPLORER

a backpack that can teach you how to fly.

The Aerocene Explorer is your personal tool for solar-powered atmospheric exploration: a tethered-flight starter kit offering a new way to sense the environment. Enclosed in a portable backpack is everything you need to float an Explorer sculpture and start exploring the skies.

Designed to engage participants in thinking-through- making activity, stimulate imagination and creativity, and impart information about solar balloon flight, thermodynamic physics, meteorological science, and art practices in a multidisciplinary way, the Explorer allows participants to draw signatures in, of and with the air, declaring independence from fossil fuels.

Like all Aerocene sculptures, the Explorer lifts off ground only using the heat from the sun, and floats without burning fossil fuels, helium, and other rare gases. 

WHAT CAN I DO WITH THE EXPLORER?

You are invited to try out the Aerocene Explorer in its beta version and investigate a different model for living and floating in this century. Feel free to customise and use it as you like, with your community, neighbours, and friends. Using the Explorer's camera, you can document your experience and share it. What was your Explorer launch like? What issue in your area would you most like to shed some light on? Introduce us to yourself, your friends, your community. Your Explorer.

The Aerocene Explorer is currently being tested and developed by a passionate global community of artists, geographers, philosophers, thinkers, speculative scientists, explorers, balloonists, and technologists, and other enthusiasts.

Have you floated with the Explorer? Share your experience with us! Write to info@aerocene.org. 

NEWS

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AEROCENE FLIGHTS

See how people launch, hack and experiment with the Aerocene Explorer! 

Esperance & Perth Explorer Flights

A duo of first ever Australian Aerocene Explorer flights took place in the last week of 2017 and the first week of 2018.

The flight in Esperance was a true testament to the ability of the wind, with a strong onshore south-westerly typical to the area, the flight was equal parts battle and dance with the wind in an attempt to gain some lift from the sun and record some aerial footage of the beautiful coastal landscape.

Aerocene Explorer flies over the CCCB

Barcelona, Spain: 30 April 2018

Only one day before the closing of ‘After the End of the World’, an exhibition about the Earth of 2017 (irreversibly transformed into the Anthropocene planet after two centuries of human impact on natural systems) and how we will reach the world of the latter half of the 21st century.

CITIZEN SCIENCE

Aerocene Explorer Performance and Interactive Display @ MIT

MIT Killian Court and Memorial Lobby, April 20th and 21st

The sky was painted a crystal blue, and from all corners of MIT, people strolled out in shorts and sunglasses. Meanwhile, a gigantic black balloon was floating on Killian Lawn. Animated by what could only be described as an otherworldly force, the object writhed midair.

SUSURRUS MEETS AEROCENE IN DRESDEN

Dresden, German: March 5th 2018

Performers Renae Shadler and Maria Nurmela launched an Explorer Sculpture  on the courtyard of Hellerau Festival Theatre to get inspired for their research.The core of the ‘Susurrus’ project  is to encourage environmental awareness through  a sensual journey that encourages audiences to sense their embeddedness within the biosphere. 

Aerocene San Luis - Expedition Logbook

November 2nd 2017 - January 8th 2018

We share a sneak peak of our adventures in the province of Argentina, where we tried some air-water-air experiments with Aerosolar Sculptures and learnt from the atmosphere by attempting to launch the first ever solar free-flight balloon in Argentina.

Aerocene Tethered Flight at Mobile Utopia Conference

Lancaster, UK: 2 November 2017

On November 2nd Sasha Engelmann, Bronislaw Szerszynski and Grace Pappas performed an Aerocene Explorer tethered flight in Lancaster, UK, within the framework of a two-day "Mobile Utopia Experiment" called "The Drift Economy”, The experimental workshop and the conference session were devoted to exploring how humans might develop an ethical and sustainable relationship with the atmosphere through vernacular ways of sensing.

Aerocene floating at Forest of Imagination

Bath, UK: 29 June - 2 July 2017

Transforming a familiar public place into an inclusive space for contemporary creativity and intuitive play, Forest of Imagination offers an immersive experience for participants. During the festival, an Aerocene Explorer Sculpture was launched to further investigate the importance of our atmosphere, collaborating with forgotten supply chains - the Planet itself.

Aerocene Launch - New design and RCA Collaboration

Münchenberg, Germany: 23 September 2017

In a sand quarry out of Münchenberg, East Berlin, the tenacious Aerocene team had the chance to experiment with two new Aerocene balloon designs and, in addition, a series of sensitive objects developed by RCA student Grace Pappas has been tested.

AEROCENE Helianthus Free Flight

Schönfelde, Germany: 22 July 2017 

In a world made of boundaries, Aerocene  is working toward a demilitarization and decolonization of the sky, to build a community that will take to the air in the spirit of a new era, and raise a new awareness of the air we all breath. This is another attempt to float within the natural rhythms of the Earth and its atmosphere, by observing the ocean above us.

Aerocene Argentina
Tata Inti - performance with eight aerocene explorer

6-7 August - Salinas Grandes - Jujuy 2017 with the support of CCK

Aerocene Explorer fly's in the Argentinean sky. Our exploration with the air and the power of the sun continues, we successfully launched eight of our explorers. All floating simultaneously, at the bottom of ocean of air,  creating signatures in the air. With Tomas Saraceno we move together with our community,towards  our commitment to a world free to move around and free of fossil fuels. 

#aeroceneargentina #aerocene #cck #tecnopolis #mediosycontenidos

Explorer launch and discussion

San Francisco, CA: 21 April 2017

Students from the "Cloud Cities, and Other Possibilities" course at California College of the Arts, led by their instructor Joseph Becker, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art's associate curator of architecture and design, successfully floated two Aerocene sculptures. 

motion tracking sensor

An Argentinian research station in Antarctica: 23 March 2017

Motion trackers developed by Alexander Bouchner (IAK-Braunschweig) were attached to two interconnected Explorers launched during a nautical journey to mark the first Antarctic Biennale. The motion trackers recorded the float patterns of the sculptures, which were converted into digital line drawings, “air signatures” on our proposed Declaration of Independence from Fossil Fuels.

explorer trio launch

Schönfelde, Germany: 4 March 2017

As part of a larger Aerocene launch, three Explorer sculptures were tethered to each other for the first time. Remaining afloat for hours, the joined family of Explorers danced through the air, their movements beautifully choreographed by the push and pull of the winds.

Want to add your launch or innovation to this page? Let us know! Write to us at info@aerocene.org. 

DIVE INTO THE AEROCENE

READ FURTHER INTO THE INSIGHTS OF THE CONTRIBUTORS OF The Aerocene Newspaper
 

'Air Crafted Architecture' — Pierre Chabard
'Saraceno's Model of Models: The Magnificence of Aerocene' — Kiel Moe
'High Altitude, Low Opening (H.A.L.O.)' — Sanford Kwinter
'Up' — Bronislaw Szerszynski
'The fixed and flowing air' — Oliver Morton
'On the Political Influence of the Sun' — Boris Groys
'Piloting the Aerocene' — Derek McCormack
'I bind the Sun's throne with a burning zone*' — Olivier Michelon
'Tianhe 天河区: Parables of the Celestial River — Jol Thomson and Sasha Engelmann
'Aerocene: Becoming Aerosolar' — A collaboration between Tomás Saraceno (Visiting Artist MIT), Leila Kinney (MIT Center for Art, Science & Technology), Lodovica Illari and Bill McKenna (MIT Department of Earth, Air and Planetary Sciences)
'Alter-engineered Worlds' — Nicholas Shapiro