Hacking existing monuments as a vehicle to communicate with the Future

The concept of the Petroglyphomat is a strategical reaction to the technical and financial boundaries which normally limit the possibilities to communicate a message to the distant future. The idea is to use long existing, important places which most likely will also exist for a long time in the future as infrastructure and expand them with a new communication layer. The machine creates snapshots of our increasingly digitalized environment by converting pixel-based, iconographical symbols into modern stone engravings (petroglyphs). 

Based on a detailed theoretical research, I extracted four aspects which are important for the long-term conservation of communication: The Attractor (How is it ensured that the future will pay attention to the message?), the Channel (In which materiality the communication is manifested?), the Encoding (In what semiotic form the message is composed?) and the Content (What information is transmitted?)
 

To ensure the attraction of the communication I chose to add them to places which are already culturally and historically charged, like the Pyramids of Gizeh or Stonehenge. Most of these places are made from stone whose materiality offers the best combination of stability in proportion to effort.

Increasing cumulative complexity of a communication system enhances the amount of information it can carry, but also impedes the process of decoding. As a reaction to this the Message and the Encoding consciously don’t try to communicate decodable information, but use symbols of our digital environments which only can be interpreted subjectively outside their regular context. The idea to add modern symbols to ancient monuments is not only a strategic conclusion, but furthermore a provocative act, which questions the traditional concept of who is writing our history.

The Petroglyphomat itself is a rudimental CNC milling machine which can drill holes from a predefined pixel matrix into variable materials.
The whole machine is transportable and powered by battery packs which can run up to 3 hours. It weights about 2,5kg and can be transported on the users back. The frame of the Petroglyphomat consists of  stainless steel, whereas the rest is constructed from laser cut plastic.