Critical Urban Ecology

Mining Chile: Traces of Nitrate

Louise Purbrick

Traces of Nitrate explores the histories and legacies of British investment in Chilean nitrate mines and involvement in its global trafficking. Through an examination of sites, artefacts and images, the project will trace nitrate’s route from natural mineral state processed in the oficinas of the Atacama desert through transported commodity and stock market exchange value to become, ultimately, part of the material and symbolic inheritances of London mansions and of estates in the capital’s surrounding countryside.

Critical Urban Ecology: Louise Purbrick

Copper mining: Miss Chuquicamata and twenty mining billboards

Ignacio Acosta

This paper discusses two series of photographs, ‘Miss Chuquicamata’ and ‘Twenty mining Billboards’ that document how the legacy of nitrate is found in contemporary copper mining. 

Critical Urban Ecology: Ignacio Acosta