Turbiner 21

Remote and “unspoilt” places are valued, and often longed for, as a foil to our urban and technologically immersed lives. Industrialisation changes our relationship with landscapes that offer new sources of energy. “Turbiner 21”, from a series of works exploring industrialised wildernesses, responds to the monumental graphical structures of a large wind park in the bleakly beautiful Norwegian island of Smöla. The fragile ecologies of “unspoilt” Northern European wildernesses are perceived to be threatened by renewables. Will a rusting forest of redundant turbines on a Hebridean island be a future Brent Spar? Arguably, a balance of environmental benefits needs to be struck beyond the scope of the 20 year lifespan of a wind turbine, as fragile landscapes become another consumable resource. In the new industrialised wilderness there is a surprisingly intense beauty in the visual and functional contrasts that arise, whilst the sense of an ancient place forever changed also resonates – for locals and visitors alike. Peat cutting gives way to plastic pipeline installation and a crofting village suddenly bristles with a string of lampposts flanking a new road to match any urban street.