An artistic research project based on practice, encounters and embodiment. Grounded in specific affective relationships with human and non-human entities, as well as places, it encompasses complex, empathetic and situated communication; daily life dialogue; and shared experiences, rituals and spiritual practices that shape existence.

• Residency: Ancestral Futures: Art and Technology for Buen Vivir

Ancestral Futures: Art and Technology for Buen Vivir proposes to explore the relationships between human and non-human and anti-hegemonic technologies in the city, looking for ways to build sustainable futures.

• Project

Website: https://chm.aliens.institute

The project frames magical practices as anti-hegemonic technologies that can mend human–non-human ties, exploring how magical knowledge can inform artistic strategies that seek to re-enchant fractured relationships with the land, aiming to demonstrate fairer forms of interspecies and inter-entity communication. During their research, the Aliens Institute undertook two immersive trips: one to the Pájaro Jaguar Reserve in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, and one to Casilla Naira in the Amazon rainforest. They also held a series of conversations in Bogotá, where they are based, and in Medellín during their one-month residency at Platohedro.

Part of the insights from the research, including three publications, a set of posters, a Tarot of Other Spirits, an amulet and more, are contained in a physical box that has been conceived as a provocation and a challenge to the fictional ontological boundaries erected by the West and its dualisms: between humans and non-humans, reason and magic, consciousness and matter, and what we consume and what consumes us.  The box interacts with a digital archive containing all accessible resources, to which it adds a selection of audio material, including soundscapes and a podcast series. This sonic proposal presents concrete records of specific voices in all their particularities and depths, inviting to listen and being traversed by their sensitivities and thought paths. These records are not a monolithic representation of an identity or alternative knowledge; what Aliens Institute aims to share is powerful due to its specificity to place, heritage and lineage.

• Artist

Aliens Institute is a collective founded by María Adelaida Samper and Gabriel Zea. Working from the Global South, they understand their geopolitical context as a place of enunciation and production, operating with the means of contemporary art to address different fields of research and explore ways of coexisting with the planet. 

Drawing on critical and horizontal pedagogical approaches, they experiment with methods of producing and disseminating knowledge that reconfigure pre-established categories and hierarchies. The hybridisation of critical theory and subaltern knowledge shape their reflections and experimentations. Acting as tricksters, they seek to destabilise ideas and interpersonal relations. 

Affective relationships and friendships constitute the substratum of their work, they activate networks of people and mobilize energies through deep hangings, circulation of speech and active listening are used to foster new imaginations, searching for fresh forms of agency with matter.

• Host Institution  

Platohedro is a collaborative creative platform with over 20 years experience. It is located in the Buenos Aires neighbourhood of Medellín, Colombia. It operates as a house open to urban life, permeated by everyday energy and cultural diversity. Since 2004, as a non-profit organisation, it has promoted artistic creation and experimentation, content production, and research into free culture and alternative pedagogies, inspired by Buen Vivir (“Good Living”) and Buen Conocer (“Good Knowing”) for the common good.

• Translocal expert

The trans-local experts are profiles that support artists during the residency, supplying relevant expert know-how and anchoring the projects firmly within the relevant regional context, demography and history, in particular in regards to the Buen Vivir and Lo-TEK philosophies. 

In this residency, the trans-local expert is Tatiana Avendaño. She started as a producer, organizing raves and free culture meetings in institutions and independent spaces, from where she has consolidated her identification with transhackfeminism. Being part of spaces such as the free and open festival Bogotrax (2004 to date) in Bogotá, and the meeting of media labs labSurlab (2011-2012), in Latin America, confirms her proximity to collaborative work and her interest in exploring the political and creative uses of technologies.

In the search for spaces for collective thought and creation she has participated as a fellow in important international research-creation platforms such as: Experimenta Sur “”Mnemophilia and Lotophagia: consumption of memory and drive to forget”” (Bogotá, 2017), Work Session Constant “”Network with an attittude”” (Antwerp, 2019), Ecole Polytechnique de Paris Art and Science Program Symposium “”Useful Fiction”” (Paris, 2019), and Materia Abierta “”The rise of the coyote”” (Mexico City, 2022), Aliens Institute “Arte para el fin de la historia: Aliens, Crypto y Baños secos” (Bogotá, 2024), NUMUN Fund “Feminist Tech Playground” (Global, 2024–2025).”

• Credits 

Artists: Aliens institute (Maria Adelaida Samper and Gabriel Zea)

Youngest Research Assistant: Leonora Licona

Conversation partners: Tahuanty Jacanamijoy, Naomi Rincón-Gallardo, Patricia Domínguez, Lina Castañeda, Juan Antonio Samper, Catalina del Mar, Agustín, Mar, Oriana y Maui, Helena, Jaba y Jate, Kraanti Luis Eduardo Granados, Alejandro Cuesta Pulido, Niñes estudiantes de la escuela los Lobitos, Abuelo Don Gilberto, Doña Mercedes, Abuelo Victor, Abuelo Valdemar, Abuelo William, Abuela Raquel, Ana,Leandro, Maicol, Nasly, Leo, Nelson Camilo y Estiven, Abuelo Nelson, Gilberto Junior (El Flaco), Doña Etelbina, Abuelo Antonio Cayetano, Juan Carlos Matapí, Doña Chela, Alex Correa, Lina María Mejía, Web3 Wasi, Cristina Correa, Sandra Ramirez, Kenny Patermina, Shara Castaño, Yuliana Rodriguez, Amapolas, Esporas, Plana y fileta, Federico Ortegón, Amalia Moreno, Luciana Fleishman, Juan David Reyes, Natalia, Laura Sofía Montoya, Milena, Mayor Luis Alberto Aguillón Chinddon, 

More-than-human collaborators: Coca, Tabaco, Yuca Brava, Yarumo, Macambo, Sachajo, Copal, Limonaria, Lancetilla, Dormidera, Clitoria, Ortiga, Flor de Jamaica, Lavanda, Menta, Siempre Vivas, Cempoasúchil, Salvia Blanca, Abre Caminos, Algodón, Ayahuasca, Chacrona, Chambira, Huito, Güeva de Toro, Vaporú, Café, Mambe, Ambil, Hayo, Tucupí, Casabe, Fariña, Yagé, Rapé, Chuchuguaza, Poporo, Mochila, Machete, Temazcal, Tarot de Marsella, DeepSeek, Claude, Fuego, Humo, Agua, Madre Vieja, Mar, Cascada, Río Palomino, Río Tacana y sus Peces, Río Amazonas, Piedras y Conchas, Esuamas, La Selva, Tancuamo, Asaí, Milpesos, Rayo, Trueno, Luvia, Cucú Ardilla,  Leo, Los Gatos, Los Perros, Tapir, Oso Perezoso, Ranas, Gusanos, Zancudos, Gegenes, Avispas, Abejas, Hormigas, Tarantulas.

Design Advisors: Relámpago, Toquica

3D design and modeling: Andrés Valles

Press: Juan Carlos Casadiego, Esperanza Coca, Torreblanca

Taylor: Rosa Gómez

Twin: Platohedro (Colombia)

Trans-local expert: Tatiana Avendaño

Liaison mediator: Anna Pinotti

Partner: HacTe – Barcelona Hub of Art, Science and Technology (Spain)

This project is realized by Aliens Institute in the framework of S+T+ARTS Buen-TEK, co-funded by the European Union under the S+T+ARTS initiative of DG CNECT (GA LC- 03568052), and implemented during the residency “Ancestral Futures: Art and Technology for Buen Vivir”, together with Platohedro and HacTe.