![]()
with Charles Quevillon
HD video with stereo sound
continuous loop 18min 13sec
single-channel projection
Installed at PAVED Arts, Saskatoon
Playing on an endless, seamless loop, Sebastian presents the viewer with a
rough and magnetic cosmic cleaner who tirelessly performs a series of
ritualistic actions inside a bucolic landscape — he swings, whips and shakes a variety of tree branches, creating a
series of tactile sounds. Boldly and tirelessly, the man repeats each gesture
in an attempt to purify and renew the space.
But this ritual cleansing contains a sinister trace, for the barn that
frames the bucolic landscape amplifies the tension between the natural and the
manmade. When the man exits the frame, the perspectival thrust of the image
draws the viewer towards the tranquil landscape, while the soundtrack of birds
tweeting and bees buzzing is a reminder that we are constantly in the midst of
movement and change. Sebastian explores repetition, re-enactment and impermanence,
while proposing that knowledge emerges through the repeated gestures of the
body.
Sebastian is adapted from musician/composer Charles Quevillon’s live performance in Room with Sticks (created with choreographers Tedd Robinson and Ame Henderson).
