Europe’s tallest structure is practically invisible. Standing 472 metres tall on the seabed in the middle of the North Sea, the Troll A platform is taller than any building on land in Europe. Not only the tallest, but also the largest and heaviest objects ever moved inhabit the North Sea to facilitate the extraction of oil and gas.
Have you ever seen them? I hadn’t.
Beyond the Horizon and Below the Waterline refers to the perceived boundaries that mark the limits of our sight—and therefore of our knowing. The industrial footprint behind these limits is not immediately visible, yet man-made structures occupy the sea, extracting the resources that become our energy, plastics, clothing, and cosmetics.
The work, a multi-media installation, translates this invisibility through video and a sound-transducing steel platform below your feet. With a blend of documentary and fiction, the video traces my attempt to find hidden oil and gas infrastructure through different dimensions and ways of looking: Above, Through, Beyond, and Below. Ultimately, the installation asks: how can something so vast remain unseen?
