Silke Huysmans & Hannes Dereere / CAMPO

In spring 2021, three ships met in the Pacific Ocean: The first – belonging to the Belgian deep sea mining company Deme­-GSR – was scanning the seabed for metals with a robot. On the second ship, scientists monitored the operations. On board the third boat – the «Rainbow Warrior III» of Greenpeace – there were activists fighting against the capitalisation of the seas. In «Out of the Blue», the two Brussels­-based artists Silke Huysmans and Hannes Dereere reconstruct this encounter. In order to find out what risks mining companies are willing to take on their hunt for resources, Huysmans and Dereere conducted interviews with crew members of the three ships. They have con­densed the material into an evocative piece of documentary theatre which raises a question concerning us all: how far are we prepared to go to satisfy our hunger for more?

Since 2016, Huysmans and Dereere have examined the current development of the mining industry. «Out of the Blue» follows «Mining Sto­ries», winner of the 2018 ZKB Patronage Prize, and «Pleasant Island». It marks the end of a trilogy on an industry extremely important to the global economy, which gradually runs out of natural re­ sources. (se)