Factum Arte's collaboration with photographer Bernd Nicolaisen is still ongoing after Masterpiece 2018 and his previous work on the imagery of the ESA/Rosetta mission: Nicolaisen’s oeuvre seeks to detect nature’s hidden artifacts where human intervention rarely, if ever, becomes apparent.

His new production is centered on the Australian Pilbara crater, an area which covers the Earth’s oldest rock formations and was irreversibly damaged in 2020. This video describes the experimental process happened within Factum Arte between 2019 and 2021, involving elevated printing technology by Canon Production Printing. 

A film by Cédric Marville

Stratagrams is a series of lightboxes aiming to materially visualise the complex elements and processes happening in the depths of the earth. After Nicolaisen provided the 2D department with the colour files, Factum experimented with gelatine inkjet printing over six glass plates, each one adding depth and colour in "building" the final result layer after layer. Encased within an illuminated aluminum box, the Stratagram is a three-dimensional visualisation of the work of geological eras.

The final lightbox © Oak Taylor-Smith for Factum Arte

The six glass plates before assembling inside the aluminum light box © Oak Taylor-Smith for Factum Arte