Ground Control
Ground Control refers to the procedures through which a landscape becomes readable as a resource. Before extraction takes place, territory is surveyed, mapped, divided, and translated into coordinates and datasets. The land installation draws from this visual language through a repeated field of crosses resembling control points and survey targets. The forms are distributed across the landscape and establish a loose grid that suggests territorial investigation.
The markers are made from wool gathered through nomadic communities and dyed with marigold flowers. Their internal structure consists of collected twigs, which are commonly used in vernacular building practices. The wool is then wrapped, and secured around the structure with yarn, forming a temporary structure. Its yellow tones refer to the saline surfaces associated with lithium extraction, where the presence and oxidation of different metals can produce shifting shades of yellow across the evaporation plains.
Wool remain closely connected to Ladakh’s cultural and material identity, while nomadic herding practices have developed through seasonal grazing routes, and forms of knowledge tied in close observation of climate and terrain. These ways of life are themselves changing in response to climate change, economic pressures, and broader social transformations. The growing interest in lithium may bring new questions around land use and grazing territories.
The project remains speculative. It considers the visual and spatial procedures through which extraction becomes imaginable. The repeated markers anticipate a possible future while remaining materially connected to the pastoral life of the present.
Material: Wool from nomadic communities, wood twigs, marigold powder
Process: Wool dying, binding
2026 - Lamayuru and Leh - Ladakh/India
Installation was produced in Lehvallee studios.
Ground Control was part of sā Ladakh Biennale 2026.
Supported by Pro Helvetia New Delhi and Pro Helvetia Design.
Lithium is mainly extracted from two types of deposits: hard-rock ores and mineral-rich brines. Hard-rock mining involves excavation, crushing, and chemical processing, while brine extraction typically pumps saline groundwater to the surface, where lithium is concentrated and separated. Both methods are highly material and infrastructural processes, despite the way batteries and digital technologies are often perceived as clean or immaterial.
Image 4: Biorxiv.org: Sampling in a lithium soncentrating pond, astrobiology.com, 2025.
Image 5: Martin Bernetti: Lithium aus einem Probenpool in der chilenischen Firma SQM, diepresse.com, 2024.
Image 6: Tom Hegen
Copyright: https://www.tomhegen.com/
To achieve different tones of bright yellow, ranging from warm to cooler shades, we used powdered marigold flower petals. To create volume and structural stability, we worked with locally collected twigs, forming a lightweight structure around which the dyed yellow wool was wrapped.