Principal Investigator: Univ.-Prof. Dr. Michael Wagreich, University Vienna
Co-Principal Investigator: Univ.-Ass. Mag.art.
Katrin Hornek, University of Applied Arts Vienna, Dept Site-Specific Art
Team members: Kira Lappé, Maria Meszar MSc,
University of Vienna
Duration of project: 01.01.2018 - 31.12.2023
Cooperation partners: Municipal Dept 29 Foundation
Engineering – Christine Jawecki, City Archaeology Vienna – Martin Mosser, Geological Survey of Austria – Clemens Porpaczy,
University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna – Erich Draganits, Matt Edgeworth (Department of Archaeology &
Anthropology, University of Cambridge)
Funding: WWTF, Emerging Field Grant (Faculty of Earth Sciences, Geography and
Astronomy)
The term Anthropocene is widely used today, and has become the
epitome for human-driven global change. In the geosciences, it stands for human intervention in geological processes and the
traces left by humans in sediment records. From the perspective of the humanities and the arts, current (post-)anthropocene
debates question changing narratives and relations of terms like “culture“ and “nature“.
On this basis, researchers
of both the University of Vienna and the University of Applied Arts Vienna, under the direction of the sedimentologist Michael
Wagreich, are mapping, quantifying and contextualising Vienna’s anthropogenic layers of rubble, and thus contributing to the
current debate regarding a new geological era.
The interdisciplinary research project works with different methods
from various fields. On the one hand, the spatial and chronological development of the Anthropocene from the ancient Romans
until today is implemented into a GIS (geographical information system) and reconstructed as a three-dimensional model using
historical maps and existing databases such as drill core data, respectively data from the Viennese Urban Archaeology Division.
One challenge here lies in how to render blind spots through spatial interpolation methods, where no real data is available.
On
the other hand, the increase in anthropogenic influence is investigated by geochemical methods. To characterise and differentiate
the layers in the sedimentation archive, samples are examined for their heavy metal content to be able to draw material-based
time horizons.
Parallel to this, the visual artist Katrin Hornek is working on an essay film that maps the fabric
of Vienna’s anthropogenic underground in terms of space, time, mass, sprawl, history and accumulation rates of both the physical
strata and their digital representative. As a result, the digitalisation process of Vienna’s sub-surface is followed into
a geo-referenced landscape modeled in 3D — from the physical sample to its data record, from terrestrial body to avatar, from
location to geo-location. Points of contact between the analog and digital domains are analysed in order to trace potential
correlations and proliferating networks they may have formed.