FAMILIAR PLACES
2017
From an exercise of building a sculpture a day, almost like a three-dimensional diary, over 2 weeks, around 17 objects appear: the “creatures”. This new species, which seems to belong to a new world - the world of impulse and instinct - they have their own characteristics and personalities.
This documentary becomes a journey through the unconscious and the imaginary of each one of us, but it turns out to be a metaphor about human relationships and problems, as well as a question about our frustrations and our own existence. Almost cruelly, the public is invited to look at this beautiful but hostile place.
Available on youtube
(translation of the video below)
[First scene] 1st part
- Made of sea salt, these plains extend for indefinite kilometres of land. Scientists believe that over the years the dunes have been multiplying and that they will continue to do so, creating an environment that develops endlessly.
[Windy salt mountain]
- Time advances slowly. There is a silent void. Yet, in this arid and hostile terrain inhabit creatures completely unknown to humanity. [It is believed that only 10% of them were sighted, and since the end of the plain has not yet been found, scientists live with the difficulty of cataloguing and naming the different species of this complex ecosystem, so they call them "creatures"]
[First creature appears]
- The first creature to be spotted is strangely static, all the creatures that live here move only 1cm every three months, taking them about 25 years to walk 1 meter. This of course, translated to our notion of time, since this salty reality time has a different flow.
[Second creature appears]
- This creature belongs to a family of three more beings: The second lives on deceiving herself: she takes care of a found object like a child that could hatch at any moment. However, here in the salt plains creatures have no gender or reproductive system. Despite being aware that this object is completely inanimate, it does not admit it to itself, all in an attempt to cover up the frustration that is its existence.
[Third creature appears]
- Another member of this species also suffers existential crises: since they have no reproductive system, there is no succession, making them ephemeral. They exist only for the purpose of existing, hence this creature lives tormented in search of another meaning for life than just existing. It also has a phobia to get out of her comfort zone.
[Fourth creature appears]
- The last element belonging to this family was a disability: the "legs" are needles turned against herself. Due to her unusual curiosity, the idea of existence becomes contradictory: on one hand the constant pain of needles could be solved by immobilization, on the other hand the dream of this creature is to find out what exists beyond the dunes. Ultimately, she lives with the pain of her own ambitions.
[Needle creature appears] 2nd part
- Some of the objects found along the plain are still a mystery as to whether they are objects, creatures or remains of them. There is no day or night here and the great complexity of this new world provides defense against the human universe.
[Hair oasis appears]
- After miles and miles of terrain, the dunes are interrupted by a kind of oasis made out of human hair. Here is found a new family of species. These creatures feel the need to live in community and social ties are what feed their existence.
But here on the plains there is also evil, and afterall these beings are not that far from the most common human behavior: exclusion. [Black creature is focused] This black helpless creature was excluded from the group for being different and will live on the fringes of this family for the rest of his life.
[Entrance to the hole] 3rd part
- An entrance is found which leads to an underworld beneath the dunes. Few images were able to be captured due to their difficult access, and scientists have not yet been able to discover the behaviour of these disturbing creatures.
- Discoveries made here surprised the entire scientific community, which despite wanting to continue this incredible journey through the salt plains, also recognizes that some things deserve to be left untouched and that some mysteries deserve to remain unrevealed.
Lugares Familiares, 2017
*Familiar places*
DOC, 12’, Color, PT