Landscape of Numinous Events
3-channel video, stereo sound
Full length: 19 min 47 sec.
Landscape of Numinous Events is the outcome of a series of interviews, encounters and field work conducted in 2020-2022. It was shown at Bergen Kunsthall as part of the MFA graduation show in spring 2022.
Excerpt from Landscape of Numinous Events. Bergen Kunsthall, April 2022
Visually, the video work is comprised of several lengthy takes of a camera moving across barren mountainous landscapes at a slow speed, 12 individual video portraits of people looking silently and solemnly into the camera for stretches of time spanning over 30 seconds per portrait, shots of people in a snow-covered landscape digging up holes with their hands, shovels and make-shift tools. Lastly, the video contains a time-lapse footage of a patch of ground spanning a period of over 9 months with images taken every day, once an hour from June 2021 till March 2022 as seen from the counter at the bottom of the screen.
The audio is comprised of two elements: the voice of a narrator in the foreground and the sounds of waves crashing into a shore in the background.
The video lasts 19 minutes and 47 seconds, during which the narrator describes her fascination with the genre of science fiction and expresses a wish to write a science fiction story based on her encounters with scientists, suggesting but never directly assuring the viewer that the people we see on the screens are indeed scientists. The narrator wishes to find strength, meaning, and hope in the the work of these scientists, but it appears to be difficult to achieve. The slow-paced reality of science research in a world that seems to be at the edge of rapidly unfolding destruction is far from the action-filled books the narrator is familiar with from her childhood.
In September 2020, as part of a collaboration course between the art academy of Bergen and Bjerknes Centre for Climate Research, I had the honour to join Hanna Lee and Inge Althuizen of Bjerknes/NORCE on a trip to their field site in Finnmark, Northern Norway.
In the months that followed, I invited 30 climate researchers to look into my camera for about half a minute, without having to make any statements or suggestions.