Cover Art
Cover Art | Outdoor Seating Area at the Visitor's Center
Artist Statement
joshuakim81@gmail.com
The cover art for this issue of Catalyst is from a series titled HAMBACH that I created in 2019. I had
the
chance to present my work at the “Everyday Militarisms” workshop organized at the University of Sydney in 2019
where I met and started collaborating with the co-editors of this special section on the Domestication of War.
The cover image was taken from a viewpoint across the lookout platform, Aussichtspunkt – Terra Nova 1,
with the
open pit mine Tagebau Hambach in the background. The elements juxtaposed in this photograph illustrate how the
possibility of leisure presses up against an anthropocenic nightmare of an open pit mine.
The series takes as subject a large-scale open pit lignite mine located in the western region of Germany, near
the town of Hambach. West of Köln, following the Bundesstraße past the towns of Lindenthal, Königsdorf, Horrem,
Sindorf, and then finally Elsdorf, is the Tagebau Hambach, or the Hambach Surface Mine. The company
Rheinisch-Westfälisches Elektrizitätswerk Aktiengesellschaft or Rheinish-Westphalian Power Plant (RWE) started
mining the 10,000 acre surface in 1978. Its lignite reserves are estimated to be around 1.3 billion tons, making
it one of the largest open-pit mines in Europe. However, the mine has also been the subject of controversy and
protest due to its environmental impact, displacement of local communities, and contribution to greenhouse gas
emissions. The expansion of the mine in recent years has led to the destruction of ancient forests and wildlife
habitats, leading to protests from environmental groups and locals. The mine has also been associated with the
struggle against coal and the transition to renewable energy sources in Germany. This Manhattan-island-sized
hole has consumed what was the Hambach Forest, of which only 10% remains. RWE had plans to clear the remaining
forest but was met with protests and has had to temporarily stop the envisioned expansion. In 2018, the Hambach
Forest occupation gained international attention as activists tried to prevent the clearing of the remaining
forest to make way for further expansion of the mine. There are no plans to expand the mine but instead plans
are being made to allow the forest to expand back into and through the mine.
These photographs move the viewer’s gaze from the outer boundary of the park to the interior rim of the open pit
mine. To gain public trust, a park has been built surrounding the mine, which invites engagement and leisure
activities such as horseback riding, art walks, and beekeeping. The park is a moat, built to shield and protect
the pit from a critical view, and an attempt to tame, domesticate, and undermine the public’s perception of the
open pit mine in its immenseness of size and generational affect.
These images trace the domestication of a militarized space set in the context of a coal mine envisioned to
supply Germany with power in war times when access to foreign oil is cut. The juxtaposition of the immensity of
the mine with the domestic scenes of play and leisure serve to confront the wars that are hidden in plain sight;
a war against the surface of the Earth; a war of emissions and incursions into the atmosphere; and a war against
enemies, both present and future, real and imagined, that linger in German nationhood.
The images in series capture the stark contrast between small-scale mundane domesticity and the vast open pit
mine that dominates the landscape. They highlight the impact of human activity on the environment and raise
questions about the balance between industrial progress and ecological preservation. With relation to the
special section on the Domestication of War, the images also showcase modes of domesticating the mine using a
park, deck chairs and umbrellas, swing sets, apiaries, and horse-riding tracks. The bleakness of the mine
contrasts with these seemingly everyday domestic scenes that are adjacent to each other but still not convincing
enough to persuade many visitors to brave the uninviting dust and industrial sublime of the mine that stretches
across the horizon. The HAMBACH series provokes the reader to conjure the image of the backyard/patio as a place
and product of conflict. While the open pit mine may be an especially poignant subject, there are aspects of the
domestication of war that can be seen in every suburban home; the backyard lawn that hides toxins and buries
histories of stolen land; the swimming pool or open pit of chlorinated water that belies the reality of water
scarcity. In each image of the series, the illusion of domesticity is paired with the horror of the consequences
of militarized logics of conflict and extraction.
Figure 1. Equestrian Path: When I see an image of a human riding a horse, I picture everything that is not visible. I see the truck and trailer bringing the horses from destination to destination, the invisible labor of care for the horse in the stable, the sheer volume of food and water, and all the support systems that let us create the romanticized illusion of man and nature joining seamlessly as one.
Figure 2. An Abandoned Apiary: Casual beekeeping is a high eco-value signpost. If someone wants to signal to a public their values about the environment, beekeeping creates a swarm of images. The image is constant and impactful. Beekeeping is a passive activity like how an author is always writing and reflecting upon their work, or how a method actor is practicing their craft by being. While the bees may or may not be present, the apiary signals the potential for remediation
Figure 3. A Map of the Park Surrounding the Mine: A single small image - the map - beige and laminated, which displays the absence of violence. All areas and paths are organized and tidy. To new visitors it is as if this land were always meant to be in this state. The mine has always been there.
Figure 4. Site-Specific Art Walk: Stations of the Cross. Ostensibly a Good Friday service would take the congregation around the pit to stations like this that display the journey of Christ from trial to crucifixion.
Figure 5. Wall Between the Mine and the Nearby Town: This wall protects each side from the other. The mine dirt and debris can’t fly on the updraft over the wall and the community and tourists, like myself, do not have access to this view of the mine.
Figure 6. Sprinklers: On the top of the wall, every 100 meters, these infrastructures abate dust and dirt, keeping them where they belong, inside the mine wall.
Figure 7. View of Open Pit Mine and Machinery: These excavator machines are the biggest land
vehicles on earth. The bulldozer in front of it is a pebble in comparison to the excavator. And yet, compared to
the accumulated effect of machines such as these, the mine remains unimaginably bigger.
The last station of this reportage is a visitor center of the Hambach Mine. The platform provides a 270-degree
view of the open coal mine, which supplies the energy stockpile. The façade of domesticity undermines the
public’s perception of war. The state of the domestic is the public’s support of war. Nowhere in the visitor
center is free from confrontation by what the machines unearth: coal dust and rocks.
Figure 8. Tourists Posing for Pictures, With Mine as Backdrop: Families attempt to capture this iconic destination, memorialized into the background of a photograph. The lure of that infinite horizon stretching into nowhere is so powerful that it forces us to ignore the stones of varying sizes that are constantly flying out of the pit at our bodies.
Figure 9. Visitor’s Center Play Set: The low dust cloud barely visible in the background forms the setting for this children’s play area. How much of the sand in the sandpit came from the mine? The idea of children playing while being continually rained on by small pebbles sits incongruously with the safety mechanisms - like the soft corners - of the play set.
Figure 10. Outdoor Seating Area at the Visitor’s Center: Lounge chairs face the mine, as if it were the beach or a swimming pool. Clouds of dust and dirt rise from the surface of the mine, creating clouds of coal amongst the clouds of vapor. But the dust is too heavy to stay in the clouds and comes showering down on the imagined lounging viewers.
Author Bio
Joshua Kim is an artist. To learn more, please visit https://www.joshkim.net/.