Every time we look into the starry sky, we are looking into the past. The further we go in observing space, the further back in time we travel. Astronomical observations of deep time are based on the spectroscopy of very distant objects that emit or absorb visible light, such as stars, galaxies, and black holes. With microwave emissions, cosmic rays, and gamma-ray bursts from supernovas and other transient objects, we can also trace distant times, but these emissions are better detected from outer space.
In her current research project, which started during the Astronomia residency in the mountains of Portugal and at the Haute Provence Observatory in France, artist Katarina Petrović is exploring material and immaterial ways of journeying into deep cosmic times. During PIF, she will look for traces of deep time detectable and collectable on the ground, break sunlight to observe the solar spectral absorptions in real time, and attempt to record cosmic rays using CCD image sensors. She will use a small magnetic loop antenna to search for and listen to the cosmic radio noise coming from the center of the Milky Way, and look for stardust or micrometeors – very small meteor particles left over from larger pieces burning up in Earth’s atmosphere.
Katarina Petrović (NL/RS) is an artist and researcher working with language, computation and various physical phenomena including sound, vacuum, light and radio. She creates systems, procedural works that are presented as modular installations in an online and offline space, using media such as generative text, poetry, sound, software and performance. She holds a MMus degree from ArtScience Interfaculty, Royal Conservatoire and Royal Academy of Arts, The Hague and an MFA from the Academy of Fine Arts, Belgrade. Katarina is an affiliated researcher at the trans-disciplinary research Centre Leo Apostel, Vrije Universiteit in Brussels and a guest lecturer at the postgraduate School of Thinking, VUB and ArtScience Interfaculty in The Hague. She has been the managing director of Trixie, an artist run space in the Hague since 2021 and is co-initiator of ArtScience Forum platofrm and Femkanje – art radio in Belgrade.