Mining Off-Sites Workshop in Northern Chile, Organized by the LIONESS Project (ANID–Anillos)

From March 21 to 27, 2025, the workshop Geopolitics of Lithium Off-Sites: Infrastructures, Territories, and Geologies took place across San Pedro de Atacama, Mejillones, and Antofagasta. The event was organized by LIONESS, a project funded by Chile’s National Agency for Research and Development (ANID) through its Anillos program, and co-directed by Marina Weinberg and Valentina Figueroa.

LIONESS builds on and expands the research developed through the Worlds of Lithium project, creating new spaces for collaborative inquiry into the territorial, ecological, and geopolitical dimensions of mining infrastructures in northern Chile. Marina Weinberg, a key researcher in Worlds of Lithium, now co-leads LIONESS, while Cristóbal Bonelli participates as an invited international expert.

Bringing together anthropologists, historians, artists, and scientists such as Jacinta Arthur, Cristóbal Bonelli, Valentina Figueroa, Bruno Fornillo, Hans Gundermann, Gabrielle Hecht, Enzo Isola, Potšišo Phasha, Cecilia Roa, and Marina Weinberg, the workshop explored how mining infrastructures unsettle established geographies and open up speculative and situated approaches to planetary transformation.