INTERSTELLAR Réimaginer la Terre, HAB Galerie - Nantes

Nearly a century later, the German philosopher Novalis mused: “We dream of journeys through the universe, but is the universe not within us?” This was confirmed on December 24, 1968, when the Apollo 8 astronauts witnessed and photographed, for the first time, an “Earthrise” as seen beyond our horizon. William Anders, who took this iconic photograph, later reflected: “We came all this way to explore the Moon, but the most important thing we discovered is the Earth…” 

At a time when the climate crisis is wreaking havoc, INTERSTELLAR acts as a counterpoint to the history of space exploration and the utopias of the 1970s, as epitomized by Charles and Ray Eames’ iconic film Powers of Ten, by asking a foundational question: “What if we re-imagined Earth?” In the immersive space of the HAB Galerie, “our world” is transformed into an almost unknown territory to be rediscovered through the works of twenty contemporary visual artists, photographers, videographers, and designers. 

By intertwining the infinitely distant and the extremely close, each artist reveals not only alternative perspectives or fictional forms of planet Earth, but also redefines collective futures in the form of fascinating and unprecedented alternate histories. 
The goal is to move beyond Pascal’s “uncertainty of the eternity of [our] future condition” and embrace new possibilities.