Tardigrades are microscopic survivors, capable of resisting extreme temperatures, from the absolute freezing point to extreme heat. They survive in space and can remain frozen for thirty years, resist vacuum and radiation through a chemical kind of suspended animation. Yet they are highly sensitive to climate change, when their environments are threatened due to a rise in temperatures in their natural habitats, wetlands and moss. They are resilient fighters in a microscopic format. Monumental, yet ephemeral creatures floating between life and death; as a symbol, as mystical beings, and as sculptural objects in their own.The Slow Walker project aims to place these beings as gigantic AR-objects in a lush city park, and make them visually present using geo-fencing, smartphones and/or AR glasses. The colossally enhanced creatures measure about 50×100 meters, and move extremely slowly through the parklands, grazing and interacting with the audience as they come closer. The digital artwork is accompanied by a soundtrack and a voice over, providing an extra dimension to the highly social sculpture.Partly inspired by Timothy Morton’s ideas about the “Hyperobject”, manmade phenomena that are too large to grasp, such as AI, climate change, global economy, Internet etc., this new way of experiencing the world provides ground for philosophy, science and art to merge. The piece dwells on a sense of otherworldliness, extraterrestrial and alien. Instead of a hyper object, it focuses on something minute but tangible, the Tardigrade*, to envision the passage of time, the vulnerability of life, through exploring the extreme slow tempo of the beasts at the intersection of life and death. They look at us, as if knowing.

Morton means that the sheer vastness of the Hyperobject could potentially humble our attitude, when realizing our own smallness. The awe, in front of these hybrid objects could provoke “a sort of delightful horror, a sort of tranquility tinged with terror” as Edmund Burke describes the experience of the Sublime. These two experiences are linked and interconnected, and the Slow Walker manifests both an inner and an outer motion as they mysteriously travel the city, appearing in new venues or larger numbers.These subversive digital objects turn the world inside out, while extracted from the real world, remodeled in the digital and then reappearing again in the real as artificial, friendly and sculptural, seemingly extraterrestrial creatures, reminding us of the great natural beauty and mysteries, by their very slow, trancelike movement. They encompass two worlds, the realm of life and death, changing the perspective and the way we look at life and the daily buzz of any city.The Slow Walker AR installation can eventually also be shown internationally, in connection to other festivals or exhibitions, only by moving the anchors – the geo-fencing points, and adapting the piece to its new environment.