PLANÈTE LABORATOIRE BUREAU D’ÉTUDES - EWEN CHARDRONNET

“Since the Second World War, the planet has gradually become a life-sized laboratory. The previous model of the ‘factory planet’ has given way to the ‘laboratory planet’. The planet has been captured, transformed into capital and put to work becoming a stranger to itself in the process, or being managed like any other innovative company.

We are the laboratory subjects, but can we somehow regain possession of this immense, autonomous machine that has now taken on a momentum of its own? Can we change the destiny and the choices of this laboratory?”

The 5th issue of The Laboratory Planet will aim to shed a different light on the current catastrophe. It will notably envisage the devastation of the Earth as being part of the preparation to abandon it in the future, as a symptom of alien capitalism. The term ‘alien’ here refers to someone who leaves behind his/her terrestrial origins to become ‘other’, to adopt other corporal forms and experience other futures. This new ‘alien’ would be the result of the actions of a powerful force which, in the name of humanity’s cosmic destiny, would strive to either redefine evolution, or set itself free from human and non-human co-evolution on Earth by leaving our planet behind and heading off into space.

The Laboratory Planet is a periodical created by Ewen Chardronnet and the Bureau d’études artist’s group in 2007. Since this date, they have shared the task of editing it. As its publication is dependent on available funding, only four further issues have been published to date (2008, 2009 and 2011) with a print run of 5,000 copies in English and a further 5,000 in French. All 5 issues are free to download from the website. The periodical is distributed via a network of supporters, during cultural or activist events or when speaking at or organising events in universities.

PREVIOUS ISSUES
Issue 1 • Why are we working to our own obsolescence? (2007)
Issue 2 • Hope is not needed to act (2008)
Issue 3 • The laboratory planet or the terminal phase of nihilism (2009)
Issue 4 • The conquest of Earth by the computers (2011)

The Paris-based artists Léonore Bonaccini and Xavier Fourt form the artist-duo Bureau d´études. For the last several years, the French Group has been producing cartographies of contemporary political, social and economic systems. The visual analysis of transnational capitalism is based on extensive research and usually is presented in the form of large-sized murals.
Ewen Chardronnet is an author, artist and curator based in Paris. In the past years Ewen has been active with projects focusing on information systems and tactical media, and engaged in various collaborative works such as the Association of Autonomous Astronauts, Makrolab, Acoustic Space Lab and World-Information.Org. His recent works include electromagnetic waves related artworks with the Spectral Investigations Collective and the journal « The Laboratory Planet ». He’s currently curator for the digital city festival in Paris’ region, Futur(s) en Seine.

http://bureaudetudes.org/about/http://www.ewenchardronnet.com/about.html

http://www.ewenchardronnet.com/about.html