Artist Thomas Kneub\u00fchler\u2019s latest project addresses the geopolitical tension between the local and the global through the notion of territorial property. Land Claim<\/em> (2014), comprising a series of photographs and a video, is constructed around mining activities in northern Qu\u00e9bec. Taken in three different locations, the images in this body of work draw our attention to the complex articulation among the various actors involved in the process of appropriation of a space: whereas some show the infrastructure of the Raglan mine in Kattiniq, in the Nunavik region\u200a\u2014\u200aan isolated site only accessible via airplanes owned by the mining company\u200a\u2014\u200aothers offer views of the town of Zug in Switzerland, a tax haven, where the company\u2019s head office is located. In parallel, Kneub\u00fchler presents images of the Inuit village of Aupaluk, also in Nunavik, one of the places \u201cbesieged\u201d by the development of a new iron mining project\u200a\u2014\u200awhence the title of this series: Under Siege<\/em>. Yet, beyond this intersection that emphasizes the displacement of populations, what is highlighted is the imperceptibility of the economic power relationship itself\u200a\u2014\u200awoven between the local excavation of materials and their commercialization on the global scale. In the artist\u2019s view, this invisibility is also connected to the inaccessibility of the mining sites: not only are they isolated and underground, but they are highly monitored, controlled, protected, even hidden from the public eye. In this sense, Land Claim <\/em>extends Kneub\u00fchler\u2019s investigation begun during the polar night at the Canadian Forces Station Alert with Days in Night<\/em> (2013\u200a\u2013\u200a14), in which he seeks to understand \u201chow to make visible what is immersed in darkness.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Translated from the French by K\u00e4the Roth<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/figure>\n\n\n\n