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Surface Series

Batia Suter - Surface Series

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Preview of the new book by Batia Suter. With a text by Dieter Roelstraete. Roma Publication 160 / ISBN 978 90 77459 64 5

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Surface Series

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Batia SuterSurface SeriesWith an essay by Dieter roelstraete

roma Publication 160

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voor Leo en Johan

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industrial Landscape, 1996

‘Burg’ / Wolfgang tillmansBenedikt taschen Verlag GmbH, Köln 1998

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The Prosody of The WorldBatia Suter and Writingdieter roelstraete

n 1 the study of poetic metre and of the art of versification, including rhyme, stanzaic forms, and the quantity and stress of syllables. 2 a system of versifica-tion. 3 the patterns of stress and intonation in a language.

It is difficult to deny that there is something inherently, intrinsically counterintuitive in Jacques derrida’s momentous claim, made most dramatically and comprehensively in his 1967 landmark collection of essays entitled Of Grammatology, that the history of Western thought has been the ‘story’, by and large, of writing’s subjugation to the imperious author-ity of the voice: as I write this first sentence down, rather than speak it out loud where no one would be able to hear me anyway, I seem to either confirm or revert to the much more commonsensical view that writing somehow stands above speaking, that the writer’s searing sword is mightier than the speaker’s trembling voice, or (more banally) that the written word is really built to last, whereas the spoken word seems only doomed to disappear.however it may be, it is philosophy’s perceived historical prioritization of the spoken word over the written word – or over anything written for that matter, word or no word: of speak-ing over writing – that is the primary target of what derrida, in the aforementioned book, first identifies as ‘de-construction’, and ‘grammatology’ as a self-appointed “science of writing before speech and in speech” becomes the chosen method of this deconstructive process. for the sake of the present argument, which will turn to writing, or rather inscribing, more literally in a few paragraphs, it is worth rehearsing some of derrida’s basic assertions, some sounding (!) more or less outlandish than others (the italics are his).

1. from Plato and hegel and from the pre-socratics to heidegger, “the history of truth, of the truth of truth, has always been (...) the debasement of writing, and its repression outside ‘full’ speech.”

2. “The voice, producer of the first symbols, has a relationship of essential and imme-diate proximity with the mind. (...) The written signifier is always technical and representative. It has no constitutive meaning.”

3. “The epoch of the logos thus debases writing considered as mediation of media-tion and as a fall into the exteriority of meaning. (...) Writing will be ‘phonetic’, it will be the outside, the exterior representation of language.”

4. “There is therefore a good and a bad writing: the good and natural is the divine inscription in the heart and the soul; the perverse and artful is technique, exiled in the exteriority of the body.”

5. “Writing in the common sense is the dead letter, it is the carrier of death. (...) What writing itself, in its nonphonetic moment, betrays, is life.”

6. “The idea of the book is the idea of a totality, finite or infinite, of the signifier. (...) The idea of the book, which always refers to a natural totality, is profoundly alien to the sense of writing. It is the encyclopedic protection of theology and of logo-centrism against the disruption of writing, against its aphoristic energy, and (...) against difference in general.”

7. “Before being its object, writing is the condition of the episteme.”8. “Writing (...) signifies forgetfulness.”9. “‘The tyranny of writing’, saussure says elsewhere. That tyranny is at bottom the

mastery of the body over the soul.”10. “one could call play the absence of the transcendental signified as limitlessness

of play, that is to say as the destruction of onto-theology and the metaphysics of presence. (...) The Phaedrus condemned writing precisely as play – paidia – and

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opposed such childishness to the adult gravity (spoude) of speech. (...) from the very opening of the game, then, we are within the becoming-unmotivated of the symbol. (...) The immotivation of the trace ought now to be understood as an oper-ation and not as a state, as an active movement, a demotivation, and not as a given structure. science of the ‘arbitrariness of the sign’, science of the immotivation of the trace, science of writing before speech and in speech: grammatology.”

once again seemingly counterintuitively, derrida seeks overall to align writing with the body (as opposed to speech’s marriage to the higher regions of ‘heart and soul’). This in turn helps to bring the critical thrust of his ‘grammatology’ into line with the long history of philosophy’s rebellion against the culture of fear, repression and suspicion of the body, which philosophical orthodoxy itself has done so much to institute as one of the foundation-al principles of Western thought. In contradistinction to the voice’s heaven-bound propul-sion – that which defines it as an instrument of what derrida calls ‘onto-theology’ – writing, as an activity (operation, active movement) of the body, belongs to the sublunary, to the earth. Writing, in this sense, is not unlike walking – the body’s preferred ‘science’ of remind-ing itself of its own earthly embodiment (we always walk the earth, and really nothing else – such are the dictates of gravity): both are methods of tracing – arts of the trace.

With this geo-logical ‘art of the trace’ we arrive, after the appropriately derridean detour of writing-about-writing, at the ‘real’ scene of our present reflection – the (literally graphic) art of Batia suter, more specifically her Surface Series project.

Surface Series is a book of (found) landscape photographs – the nature of the landscape being such that most photographs of it are aerial photographs, so they are also photographs of ‘airscapes’ (and thus we continue the derridean dialectic of celestial/vocal versus chthonic/scriptorial) – book-ended by two very similar images that mostly only differ in the darkness (or lightness) of their subjects’ surroundings. The first photograph is of a monstrous cater-pillar vehicle plodding its way through an impossibly inhospitable landscape of endless pine forest and mud; the last one is of a vehicle very much like it, though this one is stuck in the blinding desolation of Antarctic snow. It is hard to discern anything like a human presence behind the clogged, glaring windows of both trucks – the first picture seems to have been made in siberia, the second was definitely made in Antarctica, and both could certainly be called the world’s two emptiest places – and the book quickly reveals itself to be ‘about’ human absence rather than human presence, or at least ‘about’ the traces left behind by absent humans: one more reason why it may not, in retrospect, seem so far-fetched to inau-gurate the current consideration of suter’s work with a number of quotes from what derrida himself conceived of as his most destructive critique of the age-old ‘metaphysics of pres-ence’ (hence the tiresome charge of ‘anti-humanism’ in his work).Between both extremes of black and white and material resistance, a visual (prose) poem or narrative of lines made by walking (the implied reference to richard long’s A Line Made By Walking, just like Of Grammatology also from 1967, is very deliberate – and not just because it is the artist’s year of birth) and lines made by driving unfolds: of benchmarks, circuits, pathways and roads; tracks, traces and trajectories; scars and scissions; joints and disjunc-tions; erasures and imprints; formations and measurements; of ‘writing’ onto and into the earth’s crust, sometimes a mere jotting down of a fleeting thought, sometimes an elaborate, studied inscription on skin-like surface. like other similar or otherwise comparable work in this vein – let us call it an art practice overseen, in part, by the ghost of Aby Warburg1 – part

(1) I should add here that Batia suter’s previous large-scale photo-installation-turned-publication (perhaps it is the other way round?), Parallel Encyclopedia, was included in an exhibition curated by the undersigned at the Antwerp museum of contemporary art MuhKA in the fall of 2008. entitled The Order of Things – a reference to Michel foucault’s eponymous study of the ‘archaeology of knowledge’ – this exhibition also featured the work of artists such as roy Arden, luis Jacob, Peter Piller, Joachim schmid and steven shearer, all of whom make ample use of found footage in their respective collage/montage

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of the pleasure of leafing through the book, ‘feeling’ its rhythm, or walking through the exhibition that this book has both been produced by and in turn become, resides in a sophisticated kind of guesswork and the simple satisfaction of what the German tongue so beautifully calls an ‘Aha-erlebnis’: where are these pictures from, what am I looking at, where were these photographs taken, (strange) where have I seen this face before, why does this one particular image follow that particular other? or, leading to the suspicion of some traumatic charge or other, as in Walter Benjamin’s famed reading of eugène Atget’s photo-graphs of deserted Parisian streets: what (unspeakable crime) happened here? Whereas the actual answers to these questions (obviously) do not matter, the (more or less unconscious) guesswork that is folded into our aesthetic delectation of the imagery that triggers them – for those pictures were naturally selected for aesthetic reasons – will inevitably lead to the spin-ning of certain associative tales, such as the one about human absence mentioned before. The juxtaposition of some images in this ensemble – a book always opens on two pages at once, never more, never less – may thereby lead an impatient viewer to conclude that suter’s Surface Series attempts to map out the grey zone where ‘nature’ and ‘culture’ become inter-changeable quantities; as there are plenty of fringes and margins, border areas and periph-eries or similar ‘interstitial’ spaces peppered throughout the book, it is indeed tempting to identify this potential for confusion or ambiguity as one of the project’s governing heuristic principles. What is man-made, and what is not? Is geology, which could be called one of the book’s iconographic subjects, the study of the earth before (or, better still, without) man, or does man himself constitute a geological force? Are natural phenomena eligible to the art-historical status of ready-mades, or can this only be true of photographs of natural phenom-ena? Is the human passion for patterns naturally engineered (note the seeming oxymoron in this formulation) or culturally determined? Are the Nazca geoglyphs, which do not feature in Surface Series (although I expect them to pop up at every turn of the page), the world’s biggest visual poem? Where does ‘land’ end and ‘art’ begin?2 etc. The work’s virtue clearly resides, in part, in the number of questions raised and left unanswered – the only image that in truth seems to be missing from the book is not so much a Nazca geoglyph but a giant question mark seared in the earth’s unyielding crust.

But let us return to the trace, so as to retrace our steps.

When Jacques derrida, in his Of Grammatology, readies himself to dismantle, once and for all (and he has been very successful in this regard) the formidable edifice that is the occiden-tal tradition of a ‘metaphysics of presence’, he does so not merely to unmask its underlying “rage for unity” and totality as essentially totalitarian modes of thought – though this is of course an all-important dimension of his singularly ‘anti-philosophical’ motivation – but also with the debunking of the obsessive Western myth of origin (and originality) in mind. [“Where are you from? Where does this come from?” The answer is mostly the same: from the earth.] That so much of philosophy’s constructive energy should go into a destructive critique of the interlaced mythologies of origin, unity and wholeness was of course only

practices. Aby Warburg, whose work (and working method) has been the subject of a remarkably resurgent interest on the part of visual artists in particular, in some sense acted as one of the project’s guiding spirits (although artists such as Tobias Büche, Geoffrey farmer and Goshka Macuga, who address Warburg much more directly than the aforementioned, were not included in the exhibition). Another such spirit was that of Michel foucault himself; the title of the current essay is a reference to the first chapter of The Order of Things, entitled “The Prose of the World.” (2) There are, of course, no images of land Art projects to be found anywhere in Batia suter’s faux land-artsy Surface Series, though it is worth remembering some of the remarks of the movement’s most vocal proponent, robert smithson, in his essay “A sedimentation of the Mind: earth Projects” from 1968: “The earth’s surface and the figments of the mind have a way of disintegrating into discrete regions of art. Various agents, both fictional and real, somehow trade places with each other (...) one’s mind and the earth are in a constant state of erosion, mental rivers wear away abstract banks, brain waves undermine cliffs of thought, ideas decompose into stones of unknowing, and conceptual crystallizations break apart into deposits of gritty reason.” Then, towards the end of this influential text: “a great artist can make art by simply casting a glance. A set of glances could be as solid as any thing or place, but the society continues to cheat the artist out of his ‘art of looking’, by only valuing ‘art objects’.”

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logical, after a shell-shocked generation of philosophers had to take stock of the role that these very concepts had been allowed to play in the mid-century escalation of totalitar-ian ideologies in the former heartland of the european enlightenment. And with the bitter memory of Martin heidegger’s brief (and painfully unresolved) flirtation with National socialism in particular in mind, it is also only logical that critical thinking had to vanquish the looming spectre of origins first and foremost. (second in line after the arch-heideggeri-an question of origins was the ghost of totality or wholeness, against whom the testimony of the trace or fragment was invoked, cfr. infra.) Much of derrida’s grammatological experi-ment revolves around the programmatic ‘forgetting’ of origins, and around the subsequent liberation of origin’s chimerical other, i.e. the trace. here too, it is perhaps useful to remind ourselves of some of derrida’s utterances on the subject (the italics are, once again, his).

1. “The trace is not only the disappearance of origin – within the discourse that we sustain and according to the path that we follow it means that the origin did not even disappear, that it was never constituted except reciprocally by a nonorigin, the trace, which thus becomes the origin of the origin.”

2. “The (pure) trace is differance. (…) differance is therefore the formation of form.”3. “The trace is in fact the absolute origin of sense in general. Which amounts to saying once

again that there is no absolute origin of sense in general. The trace is the differance which opens appearance and signification.”

4. “spacing as writing is the becoming-absent and the becoming-unconscious of the subject.”

5. “Within the horizontality of spacing (…). If the trace, arche-phenomenon of ‘memory’, which must be thought before the opposition of nature and culture, animality and humanity, etc., belongs to the very movement of signification, then signification is a priori written, whether inscribed or not, in one form or another, in a ‘sensible’ and ‘spatial’ element that is called ‘exterior’.”

I conclude with this bizarre reflection on horizontality because it again leads us back to Batia suter’s Surface Series (which, on the related note of the grammatological exterior/interior dialectic, does not seem to include any real interiors, moreover, and which is also a tremendously silent affair): like writing itself, and although much of the views in it are seen from an olympian ‘above’, this is a ‘horizontal’ art project – indeed, it is hard to think of truly vertical surfaces (one cannot really write vertically: ink, like the very act of writing as the casting – down – of thoughts itself, is subject to gravity3). horizontal thinking critiques vertical thinking as hierarchical thinking, if not onto-theological thinking (of a divine ‘above’); in the psycho-geological terms of Surface Series, one could also conjure the natural phenomenon of striation – of stratification. And finally: horizontal thinking is, necessarily, scattered thinking, or ‘rhizomatic’ thinking, in the once fashionable theoretical lingo of yesteryear.4

(3) here, we should add that the aforementioned Parallel Encyclopedia is not just a book and assemblage of books, but also a table – that horizontal surface from which we eat and on which we write. (4) The geological metaphors of striation and stratification are central to the philosophical legacy of yet another french maître-penseur, namely Gilles deleuze, whose ‘rhizomatic’ critique of ‘arborescent’ thought – literally tree-like thinking, departing from roots (origins) to let its branches reach for the stars (transcendental concepts) – clearly echoes derrida’s plea for radically horizontal thinking. horizons as such are in fact few and far between in the haptic kaleidoscope of suter’s Surface Series, which I take to signify a symbolic acknowledgement of the ultimate impossibility of anything like the grand olympian overview, if not an implicit critique of the pan-optic or panoramic. Though many of the photographs in the book are of course taken from a great distance, the overall sensitivity to pattern that seems to have informed their selection suggests an interest in proximity rather than distance – looking at some of the grainy aerial photographs that are assembled in Surface Series is not unlike looking at a patch of intricately woven fabric at close range, or at a microscopic life form at much closer range still.

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And here, it seems, the hovering trace finally meets its maker – the fragment.

Theodor Adorno (if I may be forgiven for ventriloquizing yet another dead european philosopher!) once famously remarked that “the whole is the false” – a reversal of an equally famous hegelian quip stating that “the whole is the true”. Adorno’s truism can be found buried deep in the pages of his Minima Moralia, a book first published in 1951. Although predating Of Grammatology by some sixteen years, there is a notably derridean quality at work in this, Adorno’s most quotable collection of quotables. Indeed, it may have something to do with the writing’s tracing pace, a performative commitment to fragmentation as the only way out of the quagmire of totalizing thought, the ultimate political consequences of which were plain to see for anyone growing up among the ruins of two world wars. Now, since these books appeared four decades or longer ago, it sometimes seems as if the frag-ment and/or trace have become our only remaining reality – perhaps even our own only remaining totality. This, then, is the present-day whole: there is only scatter; there are only shards, the aerial view has long been lost – it only exists as a collection of, indeed, grainy black-and-white photographs. Is that why we are so enamoured with the equation of moder-nity and antiquity? Is that why we love ruins (and the more modern they are, the better) so much? Is that, finally, why the archaeological paradigm of digging, excavating and dusting off, holds such immense appeal for all us inhabitants of a world we desperately want to experience as ‘art’? for that is what archaeology does: it hands us only fragments and shards (‘traces’) where once, in fictitious geological times, there was – superficially – wholeness and one.

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soUrCes ANd CAPTIoNs *

p. 7 Bild der Wissenschaft, No. 12. dVA stuttgart 1971der Norden Kanadas galt noch vor wenigen Jahren als unzugängliche und relativ wertlose Wildnis. Auf superbreiten raupen pflügt sich ein lastzug vom depotplatz durch “muskeg” bis zum nordwärts vorschnellenden highway.

p. 8 National Geographic, Vol. 155, No. 2. The National Geographic society, Washington d.C. 1979

on the immense canvas of the outback, a lonesome road sketches a pencil-thin line through southwest Queensland.

p. 9 stefan lorant, The Life and Times of Theodore Roosvelt. doubleday & Company, Garden City, New york 1959

The Culebra Cut - a section of the Panama Canal.

p. 10-11 Bild der Wissenschaft, No. 12. dVA stuttgart 1971Zumeist meridiangerade brechen die strassenbauer die highways durch die Wildnis zu den Bodenschätzen des “Canadian North”.

p. 12-13 Nels A. Bengtson, William Van royen, Fundamentals of Economic Geography, fourth edition. Prentice-hall Geography series, englewood Cliffs, N.J. 1956

The nitrate desert in northern Chile lies between the coastal mountain range and the lower slopes of the Andes. here, in an area about 450 miles long and up to 50 miles wide, are found the only known extensive deposits of nitrate of soda, one of the richest plant foods.

p. 14-15 Advertising in National Geographic, Vol. 155, No. 2. The National Geographic society, Washington d.C. 1979

Building for the world we live in. Toyota versus the economic problem. People who care for people who care. (study of a gas flow in cylinder to seek most efficient shape for combustion chamber.)

p. 16-17 Bild der Wissenschaft, No. 12. dVA stuttgart 1971 Austernfeld in der Nähe der Insel oléron in der Charente Maritime. es ist durch die ebbe teilweise freigelegt.

p. 18-19 Gilbert Charles-Picard, Larousse Encyclopedia of Archaeology. The hamlyn Publishing Group, Astronaut house, feltham, Middlesex, england 1972

etruscan tumuli in the cemetery of Banditaccia at Cerveteri, and interpretive plan. The black circles indicate foundations and the position of the entrance.

p. 20 La radiographie: Coup d’oeil sur Agfa-Gevaert. elpé Productions, Paris 1975

Vue aérienne de la baie du Mont-saint-Michel à marée basse.

p. 21 Gilbert Charles-Picard, Larousse Encyclopedia of Archaeology. The hamlyn Publishing Group, Astronaut house, feltham, Middlesex, england 1972

etruscan tumuli in the cemetery of Banditaccia at Cerveteri, and interpretive plan. The black circles indicate foundations and the position of the entrance.

p. 22-23 Bild der Wissenschaft, No. 12. dVA stuttgart 1971Komfortable siedlungen und wohnliche städte können nach städteplanerischen Idealvorstellungen

entworfen und realisiert werden, wachsen über Nacht in bislang menschenleerer Wildnis. die stadt Thompson in Nord-Manitoba ist auf diese Weise entstanden. die errichtung einer riesigen Nickelgewinnungsanlage gab den Anstoss zum Bau dieser Modellstadt.

p. 24 Die Technik und der Transport auf Strasse und Schiene: Eine Rundschau über die wichtigsten Zweige der Technik als Beitrag zum Verständnis des Kulturgeschehens unserer Zeit. forum der Technik, Metz Verlag Zürich 1966

luftbild der Autorennbahn Indianapolis im staate Indiana, UsA, die im Jahr 1909 erbaut wurde und eine fläche von 2 1/4 Millionen Quadratmetern umschliesst, auf der 25’000 Autos parkieren können. - das klassische 500-Meilen-rennen (rund 805 km), das über 200 runden von je 4,023 km geht, gilt als das härteste des rennsportkalenders.

p. 25 National Geographic, Vol. 164, No. 6. The National Geographic society, Washington d.C. 1983

A neat set of courts draws the tennis-minded to hilton head’s sea Pines Plantation. opened in 1958, the carefully planned island resort community has been emulated at several coastal leisure retreats designed to provide services and security for homes and facilities that blend with the island’s natural beauty.

p. 26-27 Gilbert Charles-Picard, Larousse Encyclopedia of Archaeology. The hamlyn Publishing Group, Astronaut house, feltham, Middlesex, england 1972

Traces of a roman villa 320 metres in length. dressed stone walls are chipped by ploughing, and white fragments outline the plan on the muddy soil, which is damp in winter.

p. 28-29 M.J. Van duin, Ogen in de mist, radar in woord en beeld. Uitgeverij J.f. duwaer & Zonen, Amsterdam 1954

dit beeld verschijnt op het scherm van de installatie te IJmuiden. Als er een schip moet worden binnen-geloodst is die dus ook op dit beeld zichtbaar. heel duidelijk zien we de echo’s van de golven in de haven en van de branding aan weerszijden van de pieren. er werd zoveel zee-echo-onderdrukking toegepast, dat de echo’s van de boeien en de schepen duidelijk naar voren kwamen. Bij minder onderdrukking, dus met meer zeesluier op het scherm zouden de ware echo’s niet te onderscheiden zijn geweest.

p. 30-31 dr. A.N. Zadoks-Josephus Jitta, Antieke cultuur in beeld. Uitg. Mij C.A.J. Van dishoeck, Bussum

stadion te delphi.

p. 32-33 Unknown newspaperWeizenernte in Marion County, Kansas. der Mittlere Westen ist die Kornkammer der UsA - und der Welt. foto: Jeri Gleiter, Peter Arnold

p. 34 Crispin Gill, dartmoor: A New study. david & Charles Publishers, Brunel house, Newton Abbot, devon 1970

Grimspound: aerial photograph of the famous Bronze Age enclosed settlement, looking east.

p. 35 emily davie, Profile of America: An Autobiography of the U.S.A. The studio Publications Inc., Thomas y. Crowell Company, New york 1954

The nation on wheels. Clover-leaf highway, long Island, New york. fairchild Aerial surveys.

(*) All captions are set in their original language.

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p. 36 Focus: Nederlands tijdschrift voor algemene, kleinbeeld- en kleurenfotografie, Vol. 36, Bloemendaal 1951

leemkuil. foto: C. de G. te K.

p. 37 Mark Pimlott, Without and Within: Essays on territory and the interior. episode publishers, rotterdam 2007

rover Tracks and Mount hadley rising 15,000 feet over the Marsh of decay, by James Irwin, Apollo 15, July 26-August 7, 1971, from full Moon. Photo: Michael light, 1999

p. 38-39 La radiographie: Coup d’oeil sur Agfa-Gevaert. elpé Productions, Paris 1975

Microradiographie d’une pelure d’oignon avec christaux d’oxalate de calcium.

p. 40 dave, hullfish, Bailey, What’s Left. Co-published by Casco, office for Art, design and Theory and sternberg Press, 2009

Agricultural run-off from the Coachella Valley collects in the salton sea via a series of agricultural drains reaching up towards Palm springs.

p. 41 Bruno helly, Gonnoi I. La cité et son histoire. Adolf M. hakkert, Éditeur, Amsterdam 1973

le versant nord de l’ossa.

p. 42-43 Zeitbild der Technik. forum der Technik, Metz Verlag, Zürich 1966

Infrarotluftaufnahme für biologische Untersuchun-gen. die Aufnahme wurde auf Polaroid land Infra-rotfilm Typ 413 aufgenommen. das luftbild zeigt eine Testanpflanzung von Kartoffeln und lässt alle schwarz abgebildeten felder mit erkrankten Kar-toffeln sofort erkennen. Während gesunde Pflanzen mit gesundem Chlorophyll weiss oder nahezu weiss abgebildet werden, erscheinen Planzen mit fun-guserkrankungen schwarz, weil das Chlorophyll bereits eine Veränderung erfahren hat, auch wenn das Auge dies noch nicht erkennt. Zur Aufnahme wurde ein Kodak-Wratten-filter Nr. 25 verwendet, bei Blende 32 mit 1/30 sekunde Belichtung.

p. 44-45 Focus: Nederlands tijdschrift voor algemene, kleinbeeld- en kleurenfotografie, Vol. 36, Bloemendaal 1951

rijengrafveld Markelo 1950

p. 46-47 Focus: Nederlands tijdschrift voor algemene, kleinbeeld- en kleurenfotografie, Vol. 36, Bloemendaal 1951

luchtfoto: N.d.A.C. eelde. opname: K. h. smit, Groningen. Uit de focusprijsvraag: ‘Vrije onder-werpen’ juli 1951. K 24 luchtkamera, 14 x 14 cm, Anastigmaat f/5,6 f = 21 cm, diafr. f/8. Bel.tijd 1/400 sec. film: h.P.3 Aerialfilm. ontw. rodinal 1:50. Papier: Varigam

p. 48-49 Unknown newspaperGrootschalige sojateelt in Curtiba, Brazilië. AP

p. 50-51 Die Schweiz, vom Bau der Alpen bis zur Frage nach der Zukunft. Zehnte Buchgabe des Migros-Genossenschafts-Bundes, ex libris Verlag, Zürich 1975

p. 52 Focus: Nederlands tijdschrift voor algemene, kleinbeeld- en kleurenfotografie, Vol. 36, Bloemendaal 1951

Toneel decorateurs. opname: K.h. smit. speed Graphic 6 x 9 ektar f/4.5 f = 10 cm, diafr. f/16. Bel.tijd 1/50 sec. Pan materiaal. ontw. d.K. 20.

p. 53 Moderne Ontwikkelingen van de Luchtvaart. lekturama, rotterdam 1980

Kennedy Airport in New york is een klassiek voorbeeld van het modulaire ontwerp, dat in de zestiger en zeventiger jaren populair was voor de snelle afhandeling van een groot verkeersaanbod zowel op de grond als in de lucht.

p. 54 emily davie, Profile of America: An Autobiography of the U.S.A. The studio Publications Inc., Thomas y. Crowell Company, New york 1954

Contour farming: ‘around a hill rather than up and down the hill.’ Aerial view of six farms in Texas. J.T. Mitchell

p. 55 eugene V. epstein, stanley Mason, Elements, No. 9. dow Chemical europe s.A., horgen, switzerland 1974

A masterpiece of Nebraskan farmers. The stripes are the result of strip cropping, with bands of alfa-alfa, wheat or maize laid neatly side by side. The circles are centrepivot irrigation systems. At the bottom left, untidy Nature defends a last bastion.

p. 56-57 Mark Pimlott, Without and Within: Essays on territory and the interior. episode publishers, rotterdam 2007

The survey landscape of the West from the air (Iowa), from Google earth.

p. 58-59 Moderne Ontwikkelingen van de Luchtvaart. lekturama, rotterdam 1980

het meest succesvolle kleinere Britse straalvliegtuig is de one-eleven van de British Aircraft Corporation, dat we hier zien starten.

p. 60 Moderne Ontwikkelingen van de Luchtvaart. lekturama, rotterdam 1980

de laatste versie van de sabre jager van North Ame-rican was de f-86d, een onderscheppings-jager voor alle weersgesteldheden, met radar in de bovenlip van de luchtinlaat.

p. 61 Nigel Calder, Rusteloze Aarde: de revolutie in de geologie. sesam special, British Broadcasting Corporation, london 1972. Nederlandse vertaling: Uitgeverij Bosch & Keuning, Baarn 1973

In het midden van deze luchtfoto van de Perzische woestijn ziet men de breuk die ontstond bij de hevi-ge aardbeving van 1968. de pijlen geven de richting aan waarin de gesteensmassa’s aan weerszijden van de breuk zich ten opzichte van elkaar verplaatsen. deze horizontale verplaatsing bedroeg op sommige plaatsen wel 4,5 meter, maar er was tevens sprake van verticale beweging. de op kraters lijkende gaten geven de loop aan van de ‘qanats’, ondergrondse irrigatiekanalen.

p. 62-63 Theodor schwenk, Sensitive Chaos. schocken Books 1976 / rudolf steiner Press, london 1996

Bell-shaped forms, which travel along with the current, arise in water flowing round a submerged stone. They are here made visible by stirring up fine clay in the water.

p. 64-65 Crispin Gill, Dartmoor: A New Study. david & Charles Publishers limited, Brunel house, Newton Abbot devon 1970

stone row leading to the retaining circle of a burial mound on down Tor.

p. 66 Nigel Calder, spel op leven en dood, evolutie in het licht van de nieuwe biologie. sesam special, Uitgeverij Bosch & Keuning, Baarn 1973

Voetafdrukken, 120 miljoen jaren geleden achter-

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gelaten in Texas door een grote dinosaurus die achtervolgd werd door een roofdier, een drietenige dinosaurus.

p. 67 source unknown

p. 68-69 Christoph Krüger, Vulkanen. W. Gaade, den haag 1970

slijkpuist in het yellowstone Park. het water lijkt te koken, maar de temperatur ligt ver onder het kookpunt. het borrelen wordt veroorzaakt door opstijgende en aan het oppervlak uiteenbarstende gasbellen, zij zijn gedeeltelijk uit de onderaardse magmahaard afkomstig.

p. 70-71 Carl sagan, Jonathan leonard, De planeten. lIfe paperbacks in kleur, Perscombinatie, Amsterdam 1970

door de inslag van een 15’000 ton zware meteoriet gevormde aardse krater. diablo Canyon in de buurt van Winslow, Arizona.

p. 72-73 Focus: Nederlands tijdschrift voor algemene, kleinbeeld- en kleurenfotografie, Vol. 36, Bloemendaal 1951

de zandman is geweest. A. Meulstee, schiedam

p. 74-75 Dier en plant in polderland, flora en fauna in de IJsselmeerpolders. rijksdienst voor de IJsselmeerpolders, smedinghuis, lelystad 1967

droogvallende polder met eerste begroeiing.

p. 76 Zeitbild der Technik: Eine Rundschau über die wichtigsten Zweige der Technik als Beitrag zum Verständnis des Kultur-geschehens unserer Zeit.

Metz Verlag, Zürich 1966oberfläche eines runzellacks. draufsicht in 10-facher Vergrösserung.

p. 77 Gilbert Charles-Picard, Larousse Encyclopedia of Archaeology. The hamlyn Publishing Group, As-tronaut house, feltham, Middlesex, england 1972

Mosaic floor of a roman villa at Volubilis, Morocco. some buildings can be dated by the style of their mosaic floors, which follow a recognisable sequence of development.

p. 78-79 Zeitbild der Technik: Eine Rundschau über die wichtigsten Zweige der Technik als Beitrag zum Verständnis des Kultur-geschehens unserer Zeit.

Metz Verlag, Zürich 1966Verlängerung der Blindlandepiste um 500 m im flughafen Zürich-Kloten.

p. 80-81 Gilbert Charles-Picard, Larousse Encyclopedia of Archaeology. The hamlyn Publishing Group, Astronaut house, feltham, Middlesex, england 1972

The walls of Nineveh and part of the remains of the great city, which was first investigated during the great age of Near eastern exploration in the mid-nineteenth century. This picture captures very well the apparent confusion of a famous site. The archaeologist’s task is to make order of the evidence and extract valuable information from the result.

p. 82-83 Nels A. Bengtson, William Van royen, Fundamentals of Economic Geography, fourth

edition. Prentice-hall Geography series, englewood Cliffs, N.J. 1956

Typical patch agriculture in the tropics, in an area of “milpa” type farming. Not all the trees are cut. some of the patches are in cultivation, others are in fallow. WaKamba area, east of Kenya highlands, Africa. A small village can barely be seen in the lower righthand corner.

p. 84-85 Unknown newspaperPhoto: sergey dolzhenko ePA/Keystone

p. 86-87 Het Goud der Thraciërs: Archeologische schatten uit de DDR en Bulgarije. Museum Boijmans-van Beuningen, rotterdam 1984

seuthopolis, 4e - 3e eeuw v. Ch. (momenteel in een stuwmeer Kozamlak).

p. 88-89 DU, No. 11, Kulturelle Monatsschrift, Nov. 1958die Kimberley-diamantenmine ist heute von der stadt Kimberley um geben und wird “Big hole” genannt. es ist das grösste künstliche loch der erde. An der oberfläche besitzt es einen durch-messer von 460 m und ist 400 m tief. die Tiefe des von ihm ausgehenden grossen felsschachtes beträgt 1017 m. die Kimberley-Mine wurde am 16. Juli 1871 entdeckt. seit die Ausbeutung im Jahre 1914 eingestellt wurde, füllt sich das grosse loch mehr und mehr mit Wasser, das schon 150 m tief ist; der Wasserspiegel liegt immer noch 250 m unter der erdoberfläche. Von 1888 bis 1914 wurden 16 Millionen Tonnen “blue ground” (diamanthaltiges Gestein) aus der Mine herausgeholt und ergaben 3200 kg diamanten. der Wert aller aus dieser Mine gewonnenen diamanten wird nach heutigen Preisen auf 3’456’000’000 fr. geschätzt.

p. 90-91 Carl sagan, Jonathan leonard, De planeten. lIfe paperbacks in kleur, Perscombinatie, Amsterdam 1970

de schotel van Arecibo is een reflector die natuur-lijke radiosignalen uit het heelal bundelt tot het punt waar een detector (opgehangen tussen twee torens) ze registreert. Als de telescoop dienst doet als radarzender, gaan de radiogolven van dit instru-ment het heelal in om door een planeet te worden teruggekaatst.

p. 92 Christoph Krüger, Vulkanen. W. Gaade, den haag 1970

halemaumau, de vuuropening van de Kilauea op hawaii. In de door loodrechte wanden omgeven krater lag een lavameer dat ieder jaar door vele touristen werd bewonderd. helaas is het na meer dan een eeuw van bijna ononderbroken activiteit ten gevolge van een eruptie in 1924 verdwenen.

p. 93 Focus: Nederlands tijdschrift voor algemene, kleinbeeld- en kleurenfotografie, Vol. 36, Bloemendaal 1951

Wervelwind op een bergtop op Java. l. heuvel-mans, eygelshoven

p. 94-95 Gilbert Charles-Picard, Larousse Encyclopedia of Archaeology. The hamlyn Publishing Group, Astronaut house, feltham, Middlesex, england 1972

A roman timber building at richborough in Kent traced by the coloration of the soil.

p. 96-97 Crispin Gill, Dartmoor: A New Study.david & Charles Publishers limited, Brunel house, Newton Abbot, devon 1970

The closely spaced horizontal joints give this tor its characteristic appearance. Under past conditions they were the means by which first chemical weath-ering penetrated the rock underground and then frost action attacked exposed surfaces.

p. 98-99 r. Gheyselinck, De rustelooze aarde. scheltema & holkema’s Boekhandel en Uitgeversmaatschappij, Amsterdam 1936

Bankvormige afzondering en graniet. de Mittag-stein (zgn. Mädelstein) in het reuzengebergte.

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p. 100-101 Nigel Calder, Rusteloze Aarde: de revolutie in de geologie. Sesam Special, British Broadcasting Corporation, London 1972. Nederlandse vertaling: Uitgeverij Bosch & Keuning, Baarn 1973

IJzermijn in Mount Tom Price. de oeroude heuvels van West-Australië bevatten een enorme hoeveel-heid ijzer.

p. 101 Focus: Nederlands tijdschrift voor algemene, kleinbeeld- en kleurenfotografie, Vol. 36, Bloemendaal 1951

Materiaaleigenschappen (Publicatie van de stich-ting voor fotografisch onderzoek en voorlichting, Jan van Nassaustraat 100, ’s-Gravenhage).

p. 102-103 luna B. leopold, Kenneth s. davis, Het Water. lIfe, Perscombinatie, 1970

een opname van dichtbij - genomen op een diepte van 3900 meter - van de zeebodem bij Kaap hoorn. de stroom, van de stille Zuidzee naar de Atlantische oceaan, beweegt zich daar voort met een snelheid van anderhalve kilometer per uur.

p. 104-105 Interocean ’70, Band 1: Internationaler Kongress für Meeresforschung und Meeres-nutzung. düsseldorfer Messegesellschaft, VdI-Verlag, düsseldorf 1970

schwermineralseife im schurfloch am strand bei Pebane/Moçambique. dunkelgrau: Ilmenit, Zirkon, rutil, Monazit. Weiss: Vorwiegend Quarz

p. 106 drs. Chriet Titulaer, Operatie maan. Uitgeverij W. van hoeve, den haag

de foto is genomen vanuit de onbemande maan-satelliet lunar orbiter-2, toen deze zich op ongeveer 45 km hoogte ten Zuiden van het bekende ring-gebergte Copernicus bevond. de afstand van de maanhorizon tot de onderrand van de foto bedraagt, gemeten over het maanoppervlak ongeveer 290 km.

p. 107 Narratologie en film, Barthes en de verhaalanalyse. Versus #2/1984, sUN socialistische Uitgeverij, Nijmegen 1984 [film still from Citizen Kane, orson Welles, 1941]

p. 108 J. Jelínek, The Evolution of Man. The hamlyn Publishing Group limited, feltham, Middlesex, england 1975

View of the circular dwelling at Malta, siberia. remains of the entrance are visible in the fore-ground (after Gerassimov). horseshoe-shaped outlines of a dwelling from Malta, siberia Ussr (after Gerassimov).

p. 109 fred Bruemmer, The Arctic. optimum Publishing International, Montréal, Québec 1982

eskimos play a wide variety of games. A traditional game resembling dice, using seal bones helps pass the time during a storm.

p. 110-111 Crispin Gill, Dartmoor: A New Study. david & Charles Publishers limited, Brunel house, Newton Abbot, devon 1970

Great Mis Tor: a mass of granite boulders that has been broken off the main tor ans deposited in the form of a complex lobe. frost action under past climatic conditions is the suggested mechanism.

p. 112 Irmgard und hans Bidder. Filzteppiche. Ihre Geschichte und Eigenart. Bibliothek für Kunst- und Antiquitätenfreunde, Vol. 51, Klinkhardt & Biermann, Braunschweig 1980

Gesteppter und stoffbezogener filzteppich aus Noin Ula, Kurgan VI.

p. 113 Nigel Calder, Spel op leven en dood, evolutie in het licht van de nieuwe biologie. sesam special,

Uitgeverij Bosch & Keuning, Baarn 1973het oppervlak van Mars – bij de zuidpool – opgenomen met de televisie van het Amerikaanse ruimtevaartuig Mariner 9. Mars is de enig mogelijke kandidaat onder de planeten waar leven zou kunnen voorkomen en het onderzoek hiervan staat in zeer nauw verband met de vraag hoe het leven op aarde begonnen is.

p. 114-115 r. Gheyselinck, De rustelooze aarde. scheltema & holkema’s Boekhandel en Uitgeversmaatschappij, Amsterdam 1936

de Grand Cañon met in de diepte de Colorado-rivier. op den achtergrond de hoogvlakte van Colo-rado, waarin de cañon uitgeslepen is.

p. 116-117 Alexander eliot, Mythen van de mensheid. Uitgeverij Kosmos, Amsterdam 1977Voorhistorische rotstekeningen uit Wyoming (Verenigde staten). de tekeningen zijn in de steen gehakt en alleen voor de duidelijkheid van de foto met krijt ingevuld.

p. 118 Nigel Calder, Spel op leven en dood, evolutie in het licht van de nieuwe biologie. sesam special, Uitgeverij Bosch & Keuning, Baarn 1973

Cheloniellon calmani (met X-stralen zichtbaar ge-maakt) is een van slechts twee bekende exemplaren. het is ongeveer 400 miljoen jaren oud; een kaak-loze, gewapende vis die waarschijnlijk zijn voedsel filterde uit de modder.

p. 119 16 Rassegna (Turris Babel). editrice C.I.P.I.A., Bologna 1980

Aerial view of the ruins of Babylon, seen from the east. In the background, the euphrates.

p. 120-121 Nels A. Bengtson, William Van royen, Fundamentals of Economic Geography, fourth

edition. Prentice-hall Geography series, englewood Cliffs, N.J. 1956

The Giant’s Causeway near Portrush, northern Ireland, is one of the best known exposures of co-lumnar basalt in the world. Because of their uniform shape and structure these columns were believed by some to have been the work of giants.

p. 122 sandro Chierichetti, Siziliens Kunst - und Naturschönheiten. s.A.r. 1978

strombolicchio. foto: oreste ragusi

p. 123 DU, No. 11, Kulturelle Monatsschrift, Nov. 1958Tiroler handstein mit der darstellung Karls V., die huldigung frans I. entgegennehmend. Von Caspar Ulrich aus Ambras. 16. Jahrh. Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien. foto: e. schwenk, Wien

p. 124 De Wonderen van het Heelal, Volume I. A. W. slijthoff’s Uitgeversmaatschapij, leidende Arendskop, Arizona

p. 125 r. Gheyselinck, De rustelooze aarde. scheltema & holkema’s Boekhandel en Uitgeversmaatschappij, Amsterdam 1936

de Aardappel- of Wonderrots bij Colorado. de basis van deze 12 millioen wegende rots is ongeveer 1 meter in doorsnede.

p. 126 Mark Pimlott, Without and Within: Essays on territory and the interior. episode publishers, rotterdam 2007

Carleton e. Watkins, ‘Agassiz’, Column, yosemite, 1878, The J. Paul Getty Museum, los Angeles, 92.XM.99.8

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p. 127 dr. A.N. Zadoks-Josephus Jitta, Antieke cultuur in beeld. Uitg. Mij C.A.J. Van dishoeck, Bussum

Godin, Parthenon

p. 128-129 r. Gheyselinck, De rustelooze aarde. scheltema & holkema’s Boekhandel en Uitgeversmaatschappij, Amsterdam 1936

een door groote temperatuurschommelingen gespleten zwerfsteen.

p. 130-131 r. Gheyselinck, De rustelooze aarde. scheltema & holkema’s Boekhandel en Uitgeversmaatschappij, Amsterdam 1936

driekanters

p. 132-133 r. Gheyselinck, De rustelooze aarde. scheltema & holkema’s Boekhandel en Uitgeversmaatschappij, Amsterdam 1936

hunnebed bij Borger.

p. 134 Interocean ’70, Band 1: Internationaler Kongress für Meeresforschung und Meeres-nutzung. düsseldorfer Messegesellschaft, VdI-Verlag, düsseldorf 1970

Manganknollen aus dem östlichen Pazifischen ozean. Photo: hagemann

p. 135 r. Gheyselinck, De rustelooze aarde. scheltema & holkema’s Boekhandel en Uitgeversmaatschappij, Amsterdam 1936

Geplooide glimmerschist, puddingsteen.

p. 136-137 r. Gheyselinck, De rustelooze aarde. scheltema & holkema’s Boekhandel en Uitgeversmaatschappij, Amsterdam 1936

eivormige schriftgraniet

p. 138-139 The National Geographic Magazine, Vol. CIV, No. 4. National Geographic society, Washington d.C. 1953

This photograph is reprinted from the september, 1925, National Geographic Magazine. Agitated by dripping water, these cave pearls took shape in a milky nest, adding lustrous concentric coats of cal-cium carbonate as they grew around grains of sand.

p. 140-141 Walter shepherd, De Triomftocht der Wetenschap. h. P. leopold’s Uitg. Mij, ’s-Gravenhage 1940

een enkel groot kristal van dubbelspaat of IJs-landsch spaat, met breuken volgens de splijtvlakken. het geldstuk er bovenop is een engelsche penny.

p. 142-143 DU, No. 11, Kulturelle Monatsschrift, Nov. 1958Aquamarin, 1935 in Marambaia (Brasilien) gefun-den. 5670 Gramm, 34 cm lang, durchmesser 11 cm. Im Besitz der Gebr. Bank, Idar-oberstein. farb-photo: Manfred Bingler

p. 144-145 Nels A. Bengtson, William Van royen, Fundamentals of Economic Geography, fourth

edition. Prentice-hall Geography series, englewood Cliffs, N.J. 1956

View in one of the large granite quarries in the Barre district in Vermont. Note the blocks of even texture at left, and the evidence of banded structure near the middle at right. size of operation can be inferred by reference to men at work in lower left.

p. 146 dr. A.N. Zadoks-Josephus Jitta, Antieke cultuur in beeld. Uitg. Mij C.A.J. Van dishoeck, Bussum

Nike, een sandaal aanbindend.

p. 147 Walter shepherd, De Triomftocht der Wetenschap. h.P. leopold’s Uitg. Mij, ’s-Gravenhage 1940

Natuurlijke nabootsingen van levende vormen. Boven: landschapsmarmer. 1. Verharding in

klei die gelijkenis vertoont met een bryozoön. 2. dendritische afzetting van mangaanoxide in kalksteen. onder: kiezel in den vorm van onyx, waarvan de tekening doet denken aan de jaarringen van boomen. doorsijpelend water doet dergelijke afzettingen ontstaan; enkele er van (bv. 2) zijn ingewikkelde kristalgroeisels.

p. 148 ros, A. eichinger, Die Bruchgefahr fester Körper bei ruhender, statischer Beanspruchung, Bericht 172 / M. eidgenössische Materialprüfungs- und Versuchsanstalt für Industrie, Bauwesen und Gewerbe, Zürich 1949

Marmor I. druckversuch, pa = 1000 Atm. - Zylinderdurchmesser 20 mm, länge 60 mm, ausgeknickt

p. 149 Bild der Wissenschaft, No. 12. dVA stuttgart 1971strahlungsprofile, die wie die Konturen einer landkarte , in ein höhenschichtensystem umgesetzt werden. Auf diese Weise kartiert man radiogalaxien.

p. 150-151 edward V. lewis, robert o’Brien, Scheepvaart, Kleine Wetenschapserie. Time-life uitgave in kleur, Perscombinatie, Amsterdam 1969

een ijsberg verwijderen. Bij het open houden van het McMurdo sound Channel, een hoofdroute voor de bevoorrading van de bases aan de zuidpool, drukt de ijsbreker Atka van de Amerikaanse marine een ijsberg van anderhalf millioen ton naar zee. IJsbrekers zijn dikwijls maandenlang onafgebroken op zee en moeten daarom een enorme hoeveelheid brandstof meenemen. Voor de omvangrijke beman-ningen - gemiddeld 230 man - bevatten de provisie-kamers leeftocht voor bijna een jaar.

p. 152-153 The National Geographic Magazine, Vol. CIV, No. 4. National Geographic society, Washington d.C. 1953

Peary’s Men, detouring Around an open lead, fight Through Jumbled pack Ice. In summer such ice cakes, often 200 feet thick and several miles wide, drift across the Arctic ocean and, colliding with a cannonlike roar, throw up huge pressure ridges.

p. 154-155 Unknown newspaperIn het noordwesten van siberië legt Gazprom leidingen bij het enorme gasveld Joezjno roesskoje, dat gas moet gaan leveren voor de pijpleiding Nord stream. reuters

p. 156-157 Focus: Nederlands tijdschrift voor algemene, kleinbeeld- en kleurenfotografie, Vol. 36, Bloemendaal 1951

foto: A. s. T. te o.

p. 158 stefan lorant, The Life and Times of Theodore Roosvelt. doubleday & Company, Inc., Garden City, New york 1959

The Klondike Goldrush of 1898 which precipitated the Alaskan boundary controversy between the United states and Great Britain.

p. 159 Nigel Calder, Spel op leven en dood, evolutie in het licht van de nieuwe biologie. sesam special, uitgeverij Bosch & Keuning, Baarn 1973

Cellen

p. 160-161 sir Vivian fuchs, sir edmund hillary, De zuidpool bedwongen. Wij trokken dwars door Antarctica. scheltens & Giltay, Amsterdam 1958

Voorraaddepots op het zee-ijs aan de voet van de filchner Barrière.

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p. 162-163 rivista semestrale fondata da Adriano olivetti, Zodiac, No. 20. edizioni di Comunità, Milano 1971

Centro amministrativo “la rinascente” a Milano, 1967-1970. Progetto fase 2. Architetti: Gino Valle, herbert ohl. Collaborazione: Willy ramstein

p. 164-165 Focus: Nederlands tijdschrift voor algemene, kleinbeeld- en kleurenfotografie, Vol. 36, Bloemendaal 1951

N.l.r. Mij, Amsterdam. J. f. van hengel, Amsterdam

p. 166-167 The National Geographic Magazine, Vol. CIV, No. 4. National Geographic society, Washington d.C. 1953

Circled Cross on floe Marks the Pole. daily the earth’s northern axis alters its face as pack ice drifts across. No marker can ever fix the Pole for long. here the Arctic ocean is 14,150 feet deep.

p. 168-169 The National Geographic Magazine, Vol. CIV, No. 4. National Geographic society, Washington d.C. 1953

Cape Columbia’s Bleak headland (foreground) of-fered Peary a final Glimpse of land. sledging from ellesmere’s north coast, the Commander began his journey to the Pole March 1, 1909, a 37-day trip. flying in a UsAf plane on a routine mission, the authors retraced Peary’s route in 3 1/2 hours.

p. 168-169 sir Vivian fuchs, sir edmund hillary, De zuidpool bedwongen. Wij trokken dwars door Antarctica. scheltens & Giltay, Amsterdam 1958

het ijs van de ijsbarrière in de buurt van de Vahsel Baai begint af te breken. de ijsvlakte op de achter-grond maskeert de heuvels aan de kust.

p. 172 r. Gheyselinck, De rustelooze aarde. scheltema & holkema’s Boekhandel en Uitgeversmaatschappij, Amsterdam 1936

Uitlooper van de Jostedalsbrae in Noorwegen. Verbreeding van een gletschertong. Men lette op de spleten en het gletscherpuin op de voorgrond.

p. 173 Nigel Calder, Spel op leven en dood, evolutie in het licht van de nieuwe biologie. sesam special, Uitgeverij Bosch & Keuning, Baarn 1973

Wat bij sikkelcellen mis gaat. Bij afwezigheid van zuurstof kleven de moleculen van sikkelcel-hemo-globine aaneen en vormen lange buisjes, waarneem-baar met een electronenmicroscoop. Zij doen de cellen van vorm veranderen en voorkomen dat zij hun normale functie uitoefenen.

p. 174 Nigel Calder, Spel op leven en dood, evolutie in het licht van de nieuwe biologie. sesam special, Uitgeverij Bosch & Keuning, Baarn 1973

Genen in actie. deze opmerkelijke foto – genomen met een electronenmicroscoop – laat genen zien met ‘uitspruitende moleculen’ die voor de transcriptie van de genetische boodschappen zorgen en daar-bij zorgen voor de genetische instructies voor de machinerie van de cel. de as van elk gen is duidelijk zichtbaar door regelende moleculen er langs die bij de transcriptie helpen.

p. 175 The National Geographic Magazine, Vol. 104, No. 2. National Geographic society, Washington d.C. 1953

footprints in reverse Mark explorers’ route Across an Alaskan Pass. Weighted by 80-pound packs, Bradford Washburn and his party crushed two feet of snow beneath their boots as they crossed 18,200-foot denali Pass. Next day wind cleared the pass of its loose snow, and this pattern was left standing four to five inches above the hard surface.

p. 176-177 Postcard‘Cruz Nevada’, Isla de la Palma, Crestería de la Caldera. Juan José santos, Nº lPl037

p. 178 luna B. leopold, Kenneth s. davis, Het water, Kleine Wetenschapserie. Time-life

uitgave, Perscombinatie, Amsterdam 1970op de hellingen van de berg Athabaska in de Ca-nadian rockies komt een gletsjer door het warmer wordende klimaat langzaam naar beneden in het dal dat hij zelf heeft uitgehold. het puin aan weerszijde van de gletjser is door de gletjser van de bergen afgeschuurd. Voor de gletjser ligt een laag vuil dat achter wordt gelaten als hij smelt.

p. 179 La radiographie: Coup d’oeil sur Agfa-Gevaert. elpé Productions, Paris 1975

Microscopie électronique: acide itaconique irradié aux rayons X. Polymérisation suivant les gradins du christal de monomère.

p. 180-181 Christoph Krüger, Vulkanen. W. Gaade, den haag 1970

Wijde met betonplaten beklede krater op lipari, Italië. op de liparische eilanden was vroeger groot gebrek aan water. het kostbare regenwater kan nu niet meer wegzakken en wordt naar grote waterre-servoirs geleid.

p. 182 Nigel Calder, Rusteloze Aarde: de revolutie in de geologie. sesam special, British Broadcasting Corporation, london 1972. dutch edition: Uitgeverij Bosch & Keuning, Baarn 1973

lange parallelle barsten (crevasses) in deze an-tarctische gletsjer vormen een patroon. Ze zijn het gevolg van zijwaartse druk die een te grote spanning voor het ijs betekende. Continenten onder spanning breken op dezelfde manier.

p. 183 Advertising, 1966für wenn sie etwas ganz Besonderes suchen...Carl hotz & söhne Möbelwerkstätten, Zürich

p. 184 The National Geographic Magazine, Vol. 104, No. 4. National Geographic society, Washington d.C. 1953

Troedsson Cliffs of Cape Calhoun Advertise en-trance to Narrow Channel splitting danish Green-land and Canadian ellesmere. Crimson Walls rise 1,385 feet. Charles francis hall, sir George Nares, A. W. Greely, and Peary drove their ships past this striking promontory to safe anchorages close to the Arctic ocean, 200 miles beyond.

p. 185 Focus: Nederlands tijdschrift voor algemene, kleinbeeld- en kleurenfotografie, Vol. 36, Bloemendaal 1951

N.l.r. Mij, Amsterdam

p. 186-187 The National Geographic Magazine, Vol. 104, No. 4. National Geographic society, Washington d.C. 1953

Peary on his first Great March Across the Icecap discovered a Majestic fjord, 4 July 1892, and Named it Independence Bay. his footwear cut to pieces, the exhausted explorer stumbled to the brink of a gigantic wall 3,800 feet high and saw water stretching eastward.

p. 188-189 Nigel Calder, Rusteloze Aarde: de revolutie in de geologie. sesam special, British Broadcasting Corporation, london 1972. dutch edition: Uitgeverij Bosch & Keuning, Baarn 1973

deze gletsjer in Alaska geeft een indruk van het landschap zoals dat in grote delen van het noor-

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delijk halfrond gedurende de ijstijden moet zijn geweest.

p. 190-191 Focus: Nederlands tijdschrift voor algemene, kleinbeeld- en kleurenfotografie, Vol. 36, Bloemendaal 1951

lijnwerking

p. 192-193 r. Gheyselinck, De rustelooze aarde. scheltema & holkema’s Boekhandel en Uitgeversmaatschappij, Amsterdam 1936

de verbinding der gletschers leschaux en Nantil-lous (fransche Alpen). Men lette op de randspleten op den voorgrond en de donkere banen dwars over den gletscher.

p. 194-195 National Geographic, Vol. 155, No. 2. The National Geographic society, Washington d.C. 1979

Alaska's Violent Gulf. Thunderclaps split the air when the mighty Columbia Glacier calves icebergs from its 300-foot cliffs. Though its offspring could threaten oil tankers in Prince William. sound, passing tourist boats try to trigger a blessed event by blowing their horns. Ice at the base of its face fell as snow hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of years ago.

p. 196 National Geographic, Vol. 155, No. 2. The National Geographic society, Washington d.C. 1979

In the fishing village of hoonah live 875 of the state’s 60,000 native shareholders – all heirs to near-ly a billion dollars and forty million acres granted through the settlement act.

p. 197 Sir Vivian Fuchs, Sir Edmund Hillary, De zuidpool bedwongen. Wij trokken dwars door Antarctica. Scheltens & Giltay, Amsterdam 1958

shackelton vanuit het oosten gezien, met de reeksen brandstof- en andere voorraden.

p. 198-199 The National Geographic Magazine, Vol. 104, No. 4. National Geographic society, Washington d.C. 1953

shetland’s Gossamer Woolen shawl Could slip Through a Wedding ring. lacy in look, the shawl covers two square yards but weighs only three ounces. It’s wool, plucked from necks of sheep, was hand-spun into thread thinner than fine cotton. few woman skilled in the art are left.

p. 200-201 fred Bruemmer, The Arctic. optimum Publishing International, Montréal, Québec 1982

The wind, waves and currents carve fanciful shapes in the floes and pack ice of the Arctic.

p. 202-203 sir Vivian fuchs, sir edmund hillary, De zuidpool bedwongen. Wij trokken dwars door Antarctica. scheltens & Giltay, Amsterdam 1958

Na een sneeuwstorm is de half afgebouwde woonhut tot de dakspanten volgewaaid met sneeuw. de Pio-niersgroep moest 80 ton sneeuw verwijderen.

p. 204 sir Vivian fuchs, sir edmund hillary, De zuidpool bedwongen. Wij trokken dwars door Antarctica. scheltens & Giltay, Amsterdam 1958

oostelijk deel van de Whichaway Nunataks met links boven gletsjerspleten op de recovery Gletsjer.

p. 205 The Penrose Annual, Vol. 43. lund humphries & Co. lTd., Bedford square W.C.1, london 1949

Blocks made and printed at the l.C.C. school of Photo-engraving and lithography.

p. 206-207 Zeitbild der Technik: Eine Rundschau über die

wichtigsten Zweige der technik als Beitrag zum Verständnis des Kulturgeschehens unserer Zeit.

Metz Verlag, Zürich 1966Gefügebild von rostfreiem stahl in 15’000 facher Vergrösserung. die fadenartigen Gebilde zeigen ge-genüber dem Grundgefüge versetzte Kristallstellen, als ‘Versetzungen’ bezeichnete fehlstellen.

p. 208-209 Nigel Calder, Spel op leven en dood, evolutie in het licht van de nieuwe biologie. sesam special, Uitgeverij Bosch & Keuning, Baarn 1973

In de bladcellen zijn de delen die het zonlicht opne-men in normale gevallen groen, maar op deze foto zijn ze ten behoeve van het onderzoek gevlekt. het zijn wellicht verre afstammelingen van blauwwieren, die zich lang geleden permanent vestigden binnenin andere microben. deze vorm van ‘symbiose’ zou het begin kunnen zijn van verschillende mogelijkheden waarover cellen van planten en dieren beschikken.

p. 210-211 lútsen Kooistra en Klaasa Jansma, Witboek Friesland februari ’79. de Tille and Friesch Dagblad, leeuwarden 1979

hoe komt die auto zo keurig recht in de sloot? foto: frans Andringa

p. 212-213 The Penrose Annual, Volume 153. lund humphries & Co., Bedford square W.C.1, london 1949

fIG. 3 : oleic-acid-water-aluminium interfacial contact angle 90°. Magnification 15 diameters.fIG. 4 : oleic acid-0.2 per cent. gum arabic-alumin-ium interfacial contact angle 4°. Magnification 15 diameters.

p. 214-215 ross Adams, ronald lockley, Voyage through the Antarctic. Alfred A. Knopf, New york 1983

The ross Ice shelf. large tabular iceberg.Photo: Peter hirst-smith

p. 216 Nigel Calder, Spel op leven en dood, evolutie in het licht van de nieuwe biologie. sesam special, Uitgeverij Bosch & Keuning, Baarn 1973

Als een hydra wordt afgebroken tot individueel levende cellen en deze weer bij elkaar worden ge-bracht tot een soort worstje, reorganiseren de cellen zichzelf tot een nieuwe hydra.

p. 217 fred Bruemmer, The Arctic. optimum Publishing International, Montréal, Québec 1982

The bowhead exploits the sea’s upper layers.

p. 218 Nigel Calder, Spel op leven en dood, evolutie in het licht van de nieuwe biologie. sesam special, Uitgeverij Bosch & Keuning, Baarn 1973

fossiele bacteriën, ongeveer 2000 miljoen jaar oud, met een electronenmicroscoop ontdekt in Canadees gesteente.

p. 219 Bild der Wissenschaft, No. 12. dVA stuttgart 1971Traktorzüge auf Winterfahrt. Auf den Natur-strassen aus eis und schnee befördern sie vor allem schwere frachtgüter wie Bohrtürme oder Bergwerk-ausrüstungen nach Norden.

p. 220-221 Bild der Wissenschaft, No. 12. dVA stuttgart 1971Unberührte Waldlandschaft am Burntwood river die sich in ein siedlungsgebiet verwandelt hat.

p. 222-223 sir Vivian fuchs, sir edmund hillary, De zuidpool bedwongen. Wij trokken dwars door Antarctica. scheltens & Giltay, Amsterdam 1958

half ingesneeuwde snow-cat aan het eind van de winter op shackleton.

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Surface Series was created by Batia suter between 2008 and 2011 and contains images and fragments from other books. The initial version of the sequence was brought together for a site specific installation at Culturgest Porto, from october 31, 2009 till January 16, 2010.

The artist would like to thank all those responsible for the material, as well as everyone who was involved in publishing and reproducing it. Also many thanks to dieter roelstraete, Miguel Wandschneider, Mark Manders, roger Willems, Johan holterman, stuart Bailey, and Christina della Giustina.

Published by roma Publications, Amsterdam in co-production with Culturgest, lisbon

Text: dieter roelstraetedesign: Batia suter & roger Willemslithography: Colour & Books, AmersfoortPrinted by: drukkerij Wilco, AmersfoortPaper: Caxton 90 (inside), Colorplan vermillion sandgrain 350 (cover)Binding: hendricks & lützenkirchen, Klevedistribution: www.ideabooks.nlWebshop: www.orderromapublications.org

every effort has been made to respect copyrights while remaining true to the spirit of this artistic project. We have abided by the doctrine of fair use for illustrations and quotes. Please contact the artist or publisher if you nevertheless feel that there has been an error or infringement of copyright.

Batia suter / Surface Seriesroma Publication 160IsBN 978 90 77459 64 5

© Batia suter, dieter roelstraete, roma Publications, 2011

This publication has been made possible with the support of the Netherlands foundation for Visual Arts, design and Architecture.

roma Publicationslaagte Kadijk 148Nl-1018 Zd Amsterdamwww.romapublications.org

Culturgestedifício sede da CGd rua Arco do Cego, Piso 1 PT-1000-300 lisboawww.culturgest.pt

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