This project takes its title from the “contingency samples” collected during Apollo 11’s 1969 lunar landing, specimens gathered quickly to ensure something would return to Earth if the mission failed. The astronauts trained in Iceland, learning to read landscapes and minerals. Both this training and the idea of a contingency sample invite reflection on our own planet: in an age of crisis, what might be Earth’s contingency sample?
At the same time of the moon landing, Iceland was entering a new industrial era with aluminum. Aluminum, long a symbol of the future, linked Jamaica (bauxite), Greenland (cryolite), and Iceland (energy) in a global network. Here, aluminum itself is proposed as a contingency sample: a material that holds the potential to catalyze alternative futures, reframing progress around a more urgent question—who holds the right to produce the future?
Within the project, we use sculpture, video, poetry, and performance to explore how this material interlinks histories, geographies, and times. We will also engage in youth workshops where participants can create their own contingency samples as they answer the questions proposed by the project.
