vs

VS (or “virtual spiral”) deals with the dynamics between time and body in film. On digital video and expired 16mm film the processual nature of time and (film) body is visually transformed by spiraling camera movements. Contrary movements, distance, and proximity or depth and surface enter into a dialogue with each other. The spiral runs like a thread through the film. To create the spiraling effect, Lydia Nsiah invented a camera tracking machine and shot in studio, operating the movements of the camera live while recording. On screen we see found footage of data centers—recordings of the physical bodies of our omnipresent data cloud. Hui Ye composed the film’s immersive sound space interacting with the hypnotic and spiraling data body images.

Lydia Nsiah is an artist, filmmaker, and writer. She lives and works in Vienna, and abroad. In her works she deals with the in-between, abysses and gaps by means of film, photography, text and installation. Her films transform and incorporate found and recorded analogue and digital memory images and sounds. She publishes and exhibits internationally on forgetting and remembering, virtuality, failure and error, decolonial practice, film art and use. Her work is shown internationally in exhibitions, film festivals, and screenings.

Production Lydia Nsiah. Director Lydia Nsiah. Cinematography Lydia Nsiah. Editing Lydia Nsiah. Music Hui Ye. Sound design Hui Ye. Colour correction Lichun Tseng.

Films

2013: #000035189 (7 min.). 2016: distortion (5 min.). 2019: to forget (17 min.). 2021: vs.