stusontier: project account for acquired images and related series

Yucca Flat in the Nevada Test Site (NTS) was the location for 827 nuclear detonations conducted by the US between 1951 and 1992. It is "the most irradiated, nuclear-blasted spot on the face of the earth". The mesh of circular subsidence craters from underground tests is visible in its topography and satellite mapping, scars arrayed in their hundreds in the 400 square km basin.

The 74 kiloton ‘Hood’ in 1957 was detonated there, the largest atmospheric test ever conducted in the continental US at 5 times the size of the Hiroshima bomb. The 1970 underground ‘Baneberry’ 10-kiloton test was classified as “one of the world's worst nuclear disasters”, causing radiation exposure of 86 NTS site workers and extensive fallout across the US and into Canada. The 104 kT thermonuclear ‘Sedan’ test in 1962 blasted a 100 m deep, almost 400 m diameter crater: the radioactive fallout contaminated more than 13 million people in the US.

Sustained local protests and pressure from international treaties halted US nuclear weapons testing in 1992. But this interregnum may not last - the international arms control architecture that has largely kept nuclear testing in check for 3 decades is now becoming less and less certain. The rise of geo-political tensions and/or the collapse of arms control agreements could lead to a resumption of nuclear testing, which would precipitate a potentially catastrophic arms race.

This piece is assembled from satellite and aerial mapping, and topographical contouring, with varying physical and digital treatments of both primary and waste material. The found and processed natural sounds contain personal significance, while referencing 2005 indigenous protests over the use and  contamination of the Nevada Test Site.
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sources: Google Earth, Landsat / Copernicus, Airbus, Maxar
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mp4 | 1920 x 1080px | 1:38 | 227 Meg
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twitter.com/stusontier  |  instagram.com/stusontierphoto | instagram.com/a.i.gardening

crucible's edge

Richlister continues an ongoing use of Google Earth as both a research tool and visual output device.

In Richlister, properties of high-wealth New Zealanders are surveyed. The visual output is the result of GE in 3D mode, as it fractures the structures and the highly desired location and view.
Aotearoa underwent a well documented neoliberal onslaught in the 1980's and one which continues under both Labour and National governments. In simple terms this has resulted in a notable transfer of wealth from the poor to the superrich - not necessarily through individual greed but through a political system that many follow, where laws favour lower regulation and individual gain. The touted trickle down from the wealthy turns out (as predicted) to be a farce. To many, this seems a conservative-led throwback to a survival of the fittest mentality where the elite deem themselves worthy to rule in a feudal manner and most are disenfranchised of their political power. 
A fairer, community-based system would see a limit in wealth disparities that regulates accumulated and inherited wealth. As well as political movements, some, including the youth of some richlisters are fighting for a fairer system by supporting wealth and inheritance taxes as well as other distributive models. A better environment and climate are just a few of the potential gains. 

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sources: Google Earth, Landsat/Copernicus, SIO, NOAA, US Navy, NGA, GEBCO, Airbus
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minted May 2025 for #objkt4objkt
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twitter.com/stusontier  |  instagram.com/stusontierphoto

richlister #12 (down the hill via the underworld)

Richlister continues an ongoing use of Google Earth as both a research tool and visual output device.

In Richlister, properties of high-wealth New Zealanders are surveyed. The visual output is the result of GE in 3D mode, as it fractures the structures and the highly desired location and view.
Aotearoa underwent a well documented neoliberal onslaught in the 1980's and one which continues under both Labour and National governments. In simple terms this has resulted in a notable transfer of wealth from the poor to the superrich - not necessarily through individual greed but through a political system that many follow, where laws favour lower regulation and individual gain. The touted trickle down from the wealthy turns out (as predicted) to be a farce. To many, this seems a conservative-led throwback to a survival of the fittest mentality where the elite deem themselves worthy to rule in a feudal manner and most are disenfranchised of their political power. 
A fairer, community-based system would see a limit in wealth disparities that regulates accumulated and inherited wealth. As well as political movements, some, including the youth of some richlisters are fighting for a fairer system by supporting wealth and inheritance taxes as well as other distributive models. A better environment and climate are just a few of the potential gains. 

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sources: Google Earth, Landsat/Copernicus, SIO, NOAA, US Navy, NGA, GEBCO, Airbus
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twitter.com/stusontier  |  instagram.com/stusontierphoto

richlister, parnell #11 (three car garage)

Richlister continues an ongoing use of Google Earth as both a research tool and visual output device.

In Richlister, properties of high-wealth New Zealanders are surveyed. The visual output is the result of GE in 3D mode, as it fractures the structures and the highly desired location and view.

A recent IRD report showed how (much as in other Western democracies and many other non-democracies) the wealthier paid much lower tax rates than the poor. John Key, an ex prime minister scorned this report but during his term, the disparities increased.

Aotearoa underwent a well documented neoliberal onslaught in the 1980's and one which continues under both Labour and National governments. In simple terms this has resulted in a notable transfer of wealth from the poor to the superrich - not necessarily through individual greed but through a political system that many follow, where laws favour lower regulation and individual gain. 

The touted trickle down from the wealthy turns out (as predicted) to be a farce. To many, this seems a conservative-led throwback to a survival of the fittest mentality where the elite deem themselves worthy to rule in a feudal manner and most are disenfranchised of their political power. 
A fairer, community-based system would see a limit in wealth disparities that regulates accumulated and inherited wealth. As well as political movements, some, including the children of some richlisters are fighting for a fairer system by supporting wealth and inheritance taxes as well as other distributive models. A better environment and climate are just a few of the potential gains. 

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sources: Google Earth, Landsat/Copernicus, SIO, NOAA, US Navy, NGA, GEBCO, Airbus
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minted May 2025 for #objkt4objkt
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twitter.com/stusontier  |  instagram.com/stusontierphoto

richlister (john key former residence 1)

I look with a photographic and politically engaged eye. Google Earth is my usual camera these days. But beyond the primary colours and algorithmically cloudless skies of Google's Pretty Earth lie hidden, fictitious architectures and landscapes that serve as potent metaphors. 

These imagined underworlds act as abstractions of the real, varying in character from deceptive pleasantness to stark, industrial realities of power, hype, and hubris - forces that have often ignored the warning signs of our environmental crises.

My current research explores the colonial past and its contemporary echo in neo-colonial practices — how the language of progress can mask a permission to pillage. Historical narratives like the Great Chain of Being, as well as racially charged ideologies, have long provided moral justification for domination over the land. These frameworks, which conflate divine sanction with human superiority, have rationalised the over-exploitation of natural resources and the subjugation of populations. Today, this legacy is visible in the uneven distribution of environmental degradation, where poorer and non-white communities are disproportionately burdened by waste and pollution.

This series is a challenge to reconsider the assumed logic of domination and to envision a future where progress is measured not by the relentless exploitation of resources, but by the equitable and sustainable stewardship of our shared planet.

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sources: Google Earth, SIO, NOAA, US Navy, NGA, GEBCO
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untitled (carbon-industrial complex #5)

Satellite imaging, investigation of glitch behaviour in Google Earth 3D via Landsat / Copernicus imaging. 
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Using satellite map images in combination and modified, to investigate human impact on the Earth
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jpg | 8192 x 5378 px | 3.9 Meg 
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Sources: Google Earth, Landsat / Copernicus
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minted for #200tez   12-2024
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untitled (another greener world #6)

untitled (perhaps july peace and a span of three years)

In Edward Burtynsky's 2018 book Anthropocene, he used a satellite image of pivot irrigation in Saudi Arabia (p67).
I saw the book in 2022 and having recently started using Google Earth as a source of imagery, wondered how easy it would be to find the exact place.

As it turns out, somewhat easy if you are a stickler for detail. 
What is somewhat harder is framing the image that Burtynsky used. Google Earth's timeline mode allows one to almost precisely date the image that he used too - August 2017. Forensically, there is so much change in each image that this is the only capture that gives the same detail. 

This is a system that OSINT group Bellingcat use as part of their methodology in human rights and information verification investigations, for instance in proving that satellite images the Russian MoD put forward as evidence of Ukraine involvement in the downing of flight MH17 were faked.

Satellite imagery allows this research if the material is available and reliable, although Google Earth imagery has sometimes been radically modified by its algorithmic processes.

The process of replication of an artist's work allows you to step into their process, look at decision points and techniques and ultimately, because of different personal concerns, come out with something that uniquely deviates from any initial intention.
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sources: Google Earth, Maxar
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gif | 1400x1015px | 71 frames | 64 Meg
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deviations (before and after burtynsky 2022-2024)

A physical impression of the trees series realised as an 8 page A6 zine.
Initial collectors will get the NFT - a pdf - and the physical zine. Secondary sales will need negotiation with the seller.

The nft price includes a PDF nft, the printed zine and (non-tracked) postage. It's coming from Aotearoa / New Zealand so it might take a couple of weeks.

The zine is constructed from a single A3 laser print, folded and cut and refolded. The physical edition is 37 copies so you will receive by mail an individually numbered zine from this edition. And possibly something extra. 

In order to receive it, DM or email me your postal address. View images and a flick-through at https://acquisitive-eye.biote.net/publications/ 

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sources: Google Earth, Landsat / Copernicus, SIO, NOAA, US Navy, NGA, GEBCO, Terrametrics, Airbus

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a small collection of trees (zine version)

The waihopai valley in the south island of Aotearoa hosts mountains, agriculture, and for several decades, two radomes run by NZ spy agency the GCSB in conjunction with the US. These covered satellite dishes were part of the UKUSA interception of satellite communications. It was long felt that the US did not share all it's surveillance and perhaps operated outside of NZ law. In 2008, a dome was purposefully damaged by a Ploughshares group who stated that the base contributed intelligence to the illegal US invasion of Iraq and the "war on terror". Incidentally, the GCSB and international partners utterly failed its intelligence purpose with respect to the 2019 Christchurch terror attack.
The radomes and dishes were deemed obsolete and disassembled in 2022, presumably because other methods of spying on communications are now more effective. The remaining structures will continue to process intelligence. Given that the Australian Pine Gap facility (with 38 radomes) near Alice Springs was recently implicated in sharing information with the US and Israel that may have been used in drone assassinations, the alliances that now share such information are potentially abetting war crimes.
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- visuals: stu sontier + Google Earth sources - Planet.com, Maxar
- audio - "waihopai deconstruction": stu sontier
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mp4 | 2400 x 1564 px | 24fps | 89 Meg
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Created as part of the Art Commission @artcommission - https://328photography.xyz/art-commission/

waihopai valley dark sky chorus

rangitoto clouds | firth of thames shapes as a meditation on continuance and loss
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sources: Google Earth, Landsat / Copernicus, Maxar, CNES / Airbus
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One decade of silence for the loss of the land

The second nuclear fission bomb, codenamed 'baker', was tested on the atoll of Bikini, part of the Marshall Islands group, by the US in1946.
For baker, a bomb was detonated 27 metres under the sea and the resulting contamination spread widely, over all the observer boats, and presumably the crew.
A member of the Atomic Energy Commission called it "the world's first nuclear disaster".

US authorities evacuated Bikini and other islands prior to tests, but promised locals they could return afterwards. They were left on waterless Rongelap with only a month of food, and found a year later to be at the point of starvation. 

After testifying against Oppenheimer's security clearance in 1954, Edward Teller helped set up Lawrence Livermore National Labs, and continued the development of a fusion bomb in the US nuclear programme. 

A subsequent test series on Bikini called Bravo in 1954 created fallout that contaminated the island that Bikini residents had been evacuated to, along with other inhabited islands, and gradually spread around the globe. Rongelap Atoll was completely covered in fallout. People initially played in it and thought of it as snow.
The US government set up a secret study of fallout effects on these people.

About the death of an irradiated Japanese sailor, Teller commented "It's unreasonable to make such a big deal over the death of a fisherman".
Twenty three bombs were exploded on Bikini Atoll and although testing stopped in 1958, it remains uninhabitable.
Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists:
https://thebulletin.org/2021/03/after-75-years-its-time-to-clean-bikini/
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sources: Google Earth, Landsat / Copernicus
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gif | 1000x633px | 480 frames | 121Meg
minted for the Tezos Bake Sale supporting ziroh's bakery and the teia fountain.
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twitter.com/stusontier  |  instagram.com/stusontierphoto

nuclear family (bikini: baker)

semi-fictional trees extracted from google earth.
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sources: Google Earth, Landsat / Copernicus, SIO, NOAA, US Navy, NGA, GEBCO, USGS, LDEO-Columbia, NSF

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twitter.com/stusontier  |  instagram.com/stusontierphoto

a small collection of trees (malibu with three trees)

semi-fictional trees extracted from google earth.
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sources: Google Earth, Landsat / Copernicus

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twitter.com/stusontier  |  instagram.com/stusontierphoto

a small collection of trees (the luxor trees #16)

semi-fictional trees extracted from google earth.
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sources: Google Earth, Landsat / Copernicus, Maxar, Airbus

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twitter.com/stusontier  |  instagram.com/stusontierphoto

a small collection of trees (dancer #1)

a small collection of trees (the luxor trees #6)

semi-fictional trees extracted from google earth.
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sources: Google Earth, Landsat / Copernicus, SIO, NOAA, US Navy, NGA, GEBCO, Airbus

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twitter.com/stusontier  |  instagram.com/stusontierphoto

a small collection of trees (a bottle of meths in the mangroves)

a small collection of trees (trump trees #2)

a small collection of trees (las vagas desert golf course #1)

semi-fictional trees extracted from google earth.
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sources: Google Earth, Landsat / Copernicus, SIO, NOAA, US Navy, NGA, GEBCO

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twitter.com/stusontier  |  instagram.com/stusontierphoto

a small collection of trees (seat of power #2)

semi-fictional trees extracted from google earth.
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sources: Google Earth

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a small collection of trees (on the beach #8)

a small collection of trees (on the beach, with ascent #17)

a small collection of trees (colonial story #3 - hobart)

Collage of google tree, inkjet print, bleaching and recombination.
Part of a series of interventions with semi-fictional trees extracted from google earth.
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jpg | 7340 x 4775 px | 14Meg
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Minted for the fourth #objkt4objkt April 2024
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sources: Google Earth, Maxar, Landsat / Copernicus
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twitter.com/stusontier  |  instagram.com/stusontierphoto

beached tree bleached (1)

animation extracted from google earth
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gif | 1400 x 770 px | 17 frames | 7.3 Meg
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sources: Google Earth, Landsat / Copernicus
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Minted for the Tezos Art Vending Machine LUME Studios Event NFTNYC, April 2024
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twitter.com/stusontier  |  instagram.com/stusontierphoto

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