Phenomena, two-channel videowork, 2018.
Phenomena was created from the realisation that when one is alone there is a possibility that they do not exist, as there is no one else present to prove and acknowledge their existence. Montaging domestic scenes in metric alternation, Phenomena plays out the theory that beyond not existing when one is alone, the house continues to operate of its own accord, with the human’s presence being only in their perception.
Phenomena was created from the realisation that when one is alone there is a possibility that they do not exist, as there is no one else present to prove and acknowledge their existence. Montaging domestic scenes in metric alternation, Phenomena plays out the theory that beyond not existing when one is alone, the house continues to operate of its own accord, with the human’s presence being only in their perception.
These scenes or ‘phenomena’ give traces and implications of the house’s human inhabitants, yet the logic with which the montage progresses denies our subjective analyses and the longing to dwell further on these scenes. The phenomena of the house never acknowledge or accommodate us, their visual and aural rhythms continuing on beyond what is shown to us.
Named to reference Immanuel Kant's writings on the differentiation between Experience and Reality, the term 'phenomena' refers to one's experiences - things which are constituted by the information one takes in via their sense of sight, hearing, touch, taste and smell. Reality however is an 'accepted truth' among people. In this videowork the accepted truth addressed is that we each exist because, when we are among other people, we are sensing the others around us and are in turn being sensed by other people through being seen, heard, touched. The videowork Phenomena plays on the experience of sensing without being sensed and therefore living in the uncertainty of the truth of one's reality and experience.
