Earth Signal Universe Wide

On 16.04.2022 astronaut Eitan Stibbe activated a radio transmission from the International Space Station. The transmission carried live information about seismographic vibrations under the Syro-African Depression. These were collected by dedicated sensors at the Dead Sea - the lowest point of contact between land and air on Earth’s crust. This information was accessed by a custom built web interface, made accessible for use through the inter-planetary internet, for one user alone. The resulting transmission from the ISS then lasted precisely 90 minutes - the complete duration of one ISS orbit around Earth at a ground speed of 28,600 Km/H.

When transmitted in outer space, radio waves never lose their energy. They only decrease in amplitude as they expand outwards, onwards and away. The transmission which is Earth Signal Universe Wide was initiated from the locus on the ISS, then refracted by Earth and other celestial objects within our solar system and beyond it, and continued expanding farther at the speed of light, traveling through the vacuum of space, dissipating to infinity. ESUW is thus an open-ended electromagnetic impasto, creating an invisible artwork as large as the universe: a living sculpture of Earth, outside of Earth and beyond the purview of Earth’s inhabitants.

Collaboration with Yanai Toister.

Project website containing transmission simulation: https://earthsignaluniversewide.com/

Supported by the Pais Counsil for the Arts and the Ramon Foundation, with generous help from Dr. Ran Novitsky Nof from The Geological Institute