With the directive to create a unique alien scene, a setting no one has seen before, the recent Alienware Challenge spawned a superb collection of alien landscapes. Christophe Baliko talks about how he conceived and created a totally unique living landscape, Medusa House, with its own fragile dwellings and otherworldly inhabitants.
Concept
When I found out about the Alienware challenge it had already been running for a month. To me, the challenge was to conceive and create an extraterrestrial scene giving the impression of a place that has been inhabited, but recently become deserted. The Alienware challenge specifications forbade the representation of humans or humanoid shapes. I was suggested that challengers useg hybrid or improbable textures and avoid traditional references from well known sci-fi imagery.
I had never taken part in a contest before and as the constraints of the challenge were related to the overall impression rather than to the technique or objects, it was a real test for me. Creating a natural environment was the most complex thing. Making it unreal in one sense while realistic in another sense was a difficult task, so I decided to look for elements that are not real on earth but could exist somewhere else – and without any exaggeration. In contriving an idea, I decided to play with color and modify the gravity. I asked myself how it would be living on another planet and decided to create an aerial city in perfect symbiosis with its environment, a city with a population more natural than exists for us, and unreliant on any advanced technologies.
