Jemila MacEwan

Human Meteorite

Earthwork

Jemila MacEwan dug an impact crater into the earth, using only hand-tools, every day, for the duration of one lunar cycle (30 days). MacEwan gave live transmissions each morning as the Human Meteorite, from their remote location in Northern California. This work is a meditation on what it means to be human within the Holocene extinction.

"In considering how the impact of a real meteor is a force that transforms the surface of the earth instantly, I imagine myself as having the same potential energy only stretched out over a longer timeframe. Working routinely and gradually by hand, I will create the same outcome as the sudden violent act of a celestial meteor impact - reframing the catastrophe as a slow action. This work invokes the meteor collision as an allegory for our collective primal fear of extinction and accepts humans as the perpetrators of the gradual destruction that brings us closer to that end. "

- Human Meteorite

About the artist

Jemila MacEwan

Jemila MacEwan is an interdisciplinary artist living and working in New York. MacEwan was born in Scotland to Sufi parents, and immigrated to Australia as a child, where their upbringing intertwined scientific, mythological and spiritual ways of learning from the land. MacEwan is known for their intimately interwoven earthworks, sculptures and performances that build mythological narratives around meteorites, volcanoes, fault-lines and melting glaciers. These stories engage with the emotional complexity of humanity’s destructive impact, to the planet and to itself, as a way to understand what it means to be human within the Holocene Extinction. MacEwan asserts:

"For us to meet the challenges brought on by a world in change, we must shed the layers of denial that separate humans from the natural environment to recognize nature as a diverse network of powerful and animated forces, that deserves our attention, trust and respect."

- Jemila MacEwan