Shedding, installation view, 2015, 2-channel video projection, Iconotop, Weimar, Germany, 2015.
Shedding
Project Overview
Shedding is a 2-channel video installation. The work is composed of two separate performances I staged and filmed in Berlin, Germany in 2011. The final installed work illuminates a singular hanging backlit screen. The installation has a meditative quality because of the warm tones and slow performances that have been digitally post-processed. The bodies are highlighted with warm orange and red tones and their movements shift slowly like sand in a mesmerizing fashion as the image of a man and a woman are projected simultaneously to create this abstracted androgynous landscape.
In the years preceding this I had begun to experiment with long durational video performances which I would then loop on multiple devices in order to create virtually infinite double-exposures. This video-based installation piece is the result of one of those tests. This is no longer a film in the sense of it having a beginning and end because the image never repeats. Because of the physical materials and random number generation, this video work must be seen in real physical space because anything else is simply a simulation. I have done the best I could to document the work with a photograph.
The title is in relation to the shedding of skin, which occurs regularly with snakes when old skin is outgrown. The staging and choreography of the performances mimic this analogy of the snake shedding its skin. This piece reflects on relationships and identity and the influence of large industrial cities that never sleep. When a person sets out with the intention to look for someone they may be able to find themselves in the process. On the path to find ourselves there are many questions. Not all of them can be answered.