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Claessens' work is situated between technology and imagination, using references from science fiction, where physical infrastructures take on unique personalities. The Great Ballet in Orbit focuses on the vast space debris orbiting the Earth. Defunct satellites express emotions. To quote from Haruki Murakami’s novel Sputnik Love, the novel that inspired Claessens: “Lonely metal souls in the unimpeded darkness of space, they meet, pass each other, and part, never to meet again. No words passing between them. No promises to keep”. Viewing classifications of abandoned satellites, we learn not about their technical ability but rather of their existential fears in the vastness of space, doomed like all ‘space-junk’ to float aimlessly for eternity.