Rare Earths is a sound installation that proposes a direct and unsettling metaphor: humans devouring the planet. An edible sculpture made of salt and sugar, inviting visitors not only to eat a portion of it, but also to take with them as much salt or sugar as they wish. This act of removal mirrors everyday forms of extraction and appropriation, translating large-scale territorial exploitation into an intimate, domestic gesture.

The installation evokes the Andean landscape of the Lithium Triangle, an ecosystem composed of more than 65 interconnected brine fields stretching across Argentina, Bolivia, and Chile. This is a territory that has been historically exploited, where minerals such as silver, copper, gold, and zinc have been extracted for centuries. Paradoxically, this same region now holds approximately 65% of the world’s known lithium reserves, a key resource in contemporary narratives of energy transition and clean technology.

Rare Earths activates a process of gradual destruction within its own sculptural landscape through sound frequencies recorded in mining environments. Vibrations erode the edible mountain, displacing and fragmenting it in a literal gesture as extractive practices sustained and legitimised by the discourse of “clean energy”. This disintegration is not merely a formal outcome, but a political action promoted by international institutions and corporate interests.

The sonic space amplifies the silences that technocolonialism seeks to perpetuate: the silences of sacrificed territories, altered ecosystems, and invisibilised communities. Rare Earths confronts viewers with their own role within a global chain of extraction, consumption, and exhaustion, transforming contemplation into an act of shared responsibility.