raise | retreat | rise (2013)
Three HD videos, each 8hrs05mins at 24fps.
HD monitor. Wooden housing 100 x 100 x 9cm with three circular apertures.
A video triptych which deals with the sensory imperceptibility of climate change in our day-to-day existence — postulating it as one explanation for our collective inaction in the face of an existential threat.
Part of Re:Cinema — the Persistence of the Cinematic in Contemporary Practice.
NEW YORK CITY, USA
Venue: 25 East Gallery: Parsons The New School for Design
Address: Fine Arts Department, 25 East 13th Street, 5th floor, New York City.
Exhibition: Friday 6 December 2013 - Friday 31 January 2014.
Hours: Monday to Friday, 0900-1700.
Opening: Thursday 5 December, 1800-2000.
SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA
Venue: Sydney College of the Arts (SCA)
Address: SCA Galleries, Balmain Rd (entry opp. Cecily St), Rozelle, Australia.
Exhibition: Thursday 30 May - Friday 14 June 2013.
Hours: Monday to Friday, 1100-1700.
Opening: Thursday 6 June, 1800-2000.
Website: www.recinema.net
Enquiries: adamsebire@gmail.com
We are presented with three porthole-like apertures which take their cue from various spheres of the Earth sciences: in this case, the atmosphere, cryosphere, and hydrosphere. Through them the viewer encounters three shots of extraordinary duration. Each shot, recorded at 60 frames per second and played back at 24, runs simultaneously and continuously for eight hours and five minutes. They are recorded using digital technology unencumbered by the need to swap film-rolls or videotapes.
The duration references another work which plays with the idea of imperceptibility: Andy Warhol's 1964 film Empire also runs for 8hr05min. A single shot (but for film-roll changes) of New York's Empire State Building as it disappears into the night, Empire was filmed at 24 frames per second but is slowed to 16 during projection to further the imperceptibility of the on-screen changes.
In raise | retreat | rise each shot appears essentially unchanging but for waves, passing clouds and periodic lens-cleaning by the artist. Yet in the time taken to view the work once from beginning to end, peer-reviewed science tells us anthropogenic atmospheric CO₂ levels will be raised by approximately 14 million metric tonnes; Switzerland's mountain glaciers will retreat an average of 20mm; and the world's oceans will rise by at least 0.003mm. These changes — though disturbingly rapid in geoscience terms — lie beyond the perceptual limits of both the medium, and our senses.
Adam Sébire is a filmmaker & photographer whose documentaries have been shown at festivals and on television worldwide. His solo video & stills exhibition Roads to Nowhere was exhibited in Sydney's historical centre as part of the Head On Photo Festival, The Rocks Pop-Up and Vivid Sydney, from May to June 2012. He is now using multi-screen video art ("documentary polyptychs") to explore issues posed by climate change-driven sea level rise for a Master of Fine Arts research degree at the University of Sydney. Link to Polyptych Nº2 →
Installation views, raise retreat rise (2013) (bottom photo courtesy Ryszard Dabek).
