Sea of Instability 2017
HD video, 10 min
Music by Tenniscoats (Japan)

Sea of Instability aims to offer a trip over water, with sea as a subject, its variations, its movements, its colors, its whims and changes. The logic of moving images in my video is inform by the drawing practice, the use of darkness and light. The insistance of the use surface stands from oriental tradition of drawing. The video is a succession of changing landscapes, yet unifed by one common element – water. A simple variation in the light, the water’s surface trembling in a breeze, a passing current, an emerging wave, its appearance constantly evolving over time. Tokyo and more largely Japan, is located on three tectonic plates, the fire belt. The precariousness of human existence is part of its culture.

Sea of Instability video bypasses the metaphoric language and goes straight into poetics. It is a constructed landscape that depicts the natural disaster and its consequences on humans. Although no humans are depicted it is about their smallness in relation to the vastness of natural forces. Tragedy comes when these forces, untamable as they are wiping out humans' endeavors - hence the pathetic objects are left to float in the storm. This work is not only about powerlessness - it is about capturing the sea's power and its immense possibility to change. Then, it is about humans' response to rebuild - in sound and image - to recreate the world is to possess it. Hence the musicians and the artist work is a humble offering for the recovery and a call for peaceful coexistence with nature. It is peace offering to the sea, not its condemnation.

This video is a collaboration with japanese musicians, Ueno and Saya from Tenniscoats. I am always led down paths I had not imagined at the outset. In attempting to create my own cinematic language, associating myself with musicians expands my project, thereby extending their world.

The miniature dimensions of the sets, decors and installations used for filming come to the fore in the final large-scale projection of the work – this shift in scale creates a jarring sense of unreality, of something that hovers between reality and fiction. It gives the viewer the sense of looking at vast spaces, thereby creating imaginary and poetic worlds.