I first heard of Mars through an invitation from Vanessa Rosa. Back in 2023, she invited me and Chebel to experience Mars College and live in community in the desert.
This year was my third time participating. Over these years, I’ve been living in Bombay Beach, a tiny town with just over 250 residents. Mars College takes place during the first three months of the year, setting up camp in the desert a mile away from the town. Every year a new campus is built from scratch by the participants themselves, using wood and pallet rack structures. At the end of the season, everything is taken down, stacked, and stored for the next year—leaving no trace in the desert.
Some people live in the desert around the school. Out there, homes are off-grid: trailers, vans, cars, small wooden cabins. Mars College depend entirely on solar energy. Others live in town, enjoying the luxury of running water and unlimited electricity. This year, Mars started organizing itself into Camps. Each participant signs up for one and takes on responsibilities to help sustain community life.
We were around 80 people, all both students and teachers, shaping a shared calendar of events where we exchange knowledge. Artists, film makers, coding geeks, music makers, mathematician, philosophers, every day someone brings something new to do and learn—topics range widely: construction, off-grid systems, AI research, performance and installations, 3d, live-coding, hacking, desert ecology, culinary experiments, and more. For those who struggle with FOMO, it’s a challenge: whether to jump into everything or focus deeply to finish a final project.
At the end of the season, we organize MARS Electronica, a festival where the Mars Research building (aka Chiba) fills with art and installations. As part of it, I collaborated on the Painted Canyons event, projecting into the desert during a rave. I published that night here.
To me, as a visual artist, Mars feels like a community-based school of life—a social experiment, maybe even a simulation. A place where life, learning, and abundance come together, powered by the energy of the sun in Bombay Beach, California.
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