CryoLumen is a project produced in collaboration with the environment. Each Storm Print is a material record of a past weather storm, updated with real-time solar storm data that is viewable in Augmented Reality. 

The process begins with fleeting sculptural compositions placed over photosensitive paper and exposed under various weather conditions for the duration of local storms. They are then scanned and digitally altered to expose elements unseen in the physical paper, revealing a polarity between material and digital spaces: an ice block thaws over silver gelatin paper, to reveal its thermal qualities in a digital landscape.  

This materially dynamic process further evolves into a digitally immersive space as the prints become digital negatives of organic processes that point to invisible planetary storms. Each print is overlaid with a secondary augmented reality sculpture that uses daily data from NOAA of solar wind storms. This near-real-time data alters the digital sculptures differently each day by intensifying the flows of particles and the colors of magnetic lines computed from solar superstorms. In this way, the project connects the deeply personal archive of the artist’s local weather experience during quarantine, with the planetary position of Earth’s real-time endurance of cosmic storms.  

Acknowledgments:

The realization of this project has been kindly supported by The National Culture Fund of Bulgaria and Riyadh Art.

Real-time solar wind data by NOAA: swpc.noaa.gov/products/real-time-solar-wind. AR production assistance by Colter Wehmeier. The visualization of the coronal mass ejection is based on the magneto-hydrodynamic simulation described in Fan. Y., ApJ, 824:93, 2016. Visualization data pre-processing by the Advanced Visualization Lab, NCSA. Solar Superstorms simulations by Dr. Robert F. Stein and field line calculations by Dr. Patrick J. Moran, Michigan State University, Physics and Astronomy Department.