Xenolith is a speculative, multi-format work by Caitlin Berrigan combining film, sculpture, and augmented reality to imagine geoengineering as a queer, post-human transformation. Set around carbon capture sites in Iceland, it follows carbon’s mineralisation into synthetic rock bodies, exploring climate crisis, extraction, and shifting material identities.
Xenolith by Caitlin Berrigan is a speculative, multi-disciplinary project that explores the transformation of carbon through geoengineering, geology, and queer ecological imaginaries. Set in and around carbon capture and storage sites in Iceland, the work follows carbon dioxide as it is extracted from the atmosphere and mineralised into synthetic rock formations, becoming what the artist describes as new “geological bodies.” Combining film, sculpture, and augmented reality, Xenolith blurs boundaries between living systems, industrial infrastructure, and deep time.
The project reimagines climate intervention not only as a technical process but also as a cultural and embodied one, questioning how matter is reclassified, controlled, and reanimated. Through its shifting forms, Xenolith considers extraction and storage as acts that reshape planetary memory, while also opening space for alternative, more-than-human relationships to environmental change, transformation, and survival.
Credits
* Director, Writer, Cinematographer, Editor: Caitlin Berrigan
* Unity AR App Development: Pariah Interactive
Pariah Interactive Team
* Technical Direction: Prashast Thapan
* Development: Rishabh Kukreti
* Production & QA: Faith Zeng, Malvika Mital
Exhibitions and Events
* ORF Austria National TV Broadcast, Vienna, Austria (2024)
* Mesh Festival Panel, Basel, Switzerland (2024)