Enci - A Mosasaur View

Michiel van Bakel / Netherlands / 2025 / World Premiere / 5 min.

synopsis

The exposed bowels of the earth in a former limestone quarry near Maastricht reveal layers of rock dating back 66 million years, when this part of the planet was covered by a tropical sea inhabited by mosasaurs. The slow rotating movement of the camera, simulating a wide field of view, is accompanied by a smooth transformation of the colour spectrum—from black and white to muted grey-green tones to sharp neon colours—which conveys to the audience a vision different from that of humans. The images were captured by a multispectral camera during three time intervals of the day; the panoramic time-lapse photographs were then combined into a false-colour composition consisting of two near-infrared layers and one ultraviolet.

“Most people know false colour photography from NASA/ESA satellite imagery. It is normally used to detect forest fires, deforestation or floods or monitor crop health and earth’s carbon cycle from spacecraft. Colours are assigned to different wavelengths that human eyes cannot normally see, invoking a sort of extraterrestrial, alien viewpoint.” — Michiel van Bakel

biography

Michiel van Bakel (b. 1966) is a Dutch artist and author of videos, films, sculptures, and installations. His work focuses on the relationship between humans and their environment, the perception of time, and the transformation of reality through technology. He sees experimental video and animation techniques as tools that expand the senses—cameras, scanners, and image processing algorithms allow him to visualize what has remained invisible until now.