042 A Mess That Encodes / real-time video, silent, ∞ duration / 2019  

  Documentation on Vimeo  

"A Mess That Encodes" features a never-ending stream of space junk floating by in cosmic orbit – an iron, an origami crane, a pair of glasses, a brick. The 100 objects in the database are 3d-scanned with imperfect mobile software, resulting in distorted models seemingly damaged by trauma or the passage of time. They function together as a grammar, with each object's labeled number adding up to form strings of data that control an atomic seed, which in turn generates an ambiguous message of binary voltages. With this process of encoding, Carrington speculates about the messages hidden inside the digitally-scanned shells of artifacts, and in the operations that might take place amongst objects outside of human perception. In tandem with the metaphysical aspects of the work, “A Mess That Encodes” draws on comments from mega-billionaire Jeff Bezos about his utopic vision of human colonization of space. Instead of questioning endless growth and its damage to the planet, Bezos provides a world where the socioeconomic structures and consumerist tendencies here on Earth get propagated to the stars. Our stuff survives us as ruins, both on Earth and in space.

This piece was originally shown as part of group exhibition "Alien Phenomenology" at Made in NY Media Center in Brooklyn.

Background image of cosmos taken from NASA Image Archive.
Music in documentation is "Snow/Sand" by Taylor Deupree. Purchase album on 12k Bandcamp page .