Somebody About You – experiencing the body as a medium
In Somebody About You, the voice needs the body of the viewers to exist. Aneta’s voice is embodied in the viewers’ reactions, each time in a different form, in the bodies of different viewers. Aneta, who is terminally ill, was invited to adopt the role of the narrator of her experience. Therefore, her experience is also a documentary project, Aneta will replicate in the viewers’ bodies. In this way our film will constitute an extension of her life. The viewers, in turn, experience a transfer, they offer their bodies that will become a medium. On the border between the imagined and the proposed, between the creator and the viewer, biology and technology, the world of the living and of the objects, between the living and the dead, a hybrid being emerges, combining a human and a work of art : humart.
Somebody about you will be rooted to a much greater extent in the strategies of performative arts. That is why the experience is treated holistically. It doesn’t limit itself to the image in the headset, instead, it also makes a use of the viewer’s situation. It doesn’t dispose of the reality outside of the headset, it includes it in the matter of the image. Thus, the experience becomes real, it is an integral part of the viewer’s life.
The image is not intended to imitate, but is treated as a tool to influence the physical reactions of the viewers. A good example of this is the scene with the graphic ball. Its purpose is not to present a picture, but to move the body of the viewers, who will follow it with their eyes, and thus with their head, neck and the whole body. Director Micha? Stankiewicz is primarily interested in how graphics can affect the mobility of the viewers’ bodies and thus elicit emotional states.
The narrator’s voice occurring in the experience is treated as framing and camera movement, but also as an opportunity to layer layers invisible to the eye. The way in which the voice will speak and what it will emphasise will also resonate in the viewer’s body. That is why we invited a teacher trained for working with non-professional actors to work with Aneta.
The viewer is always a partner for director, a co-creator. That is why in his work he invites the viewer to observe him/herself and focus on his/her feelings. In Somebody About You, this observation of the impulses coming from one’s body is the essence of experience, the content of Aneta’s message. The viewer’s body becomes a medium, the heart of the message, while the individual reception of the viewers constitutes an element of randomness characteristic of generative art.
