Area Composer win the Genius Loci Weimar Competition
Our installation »EMPATHY« will be performed at the Buchenwald Memorial from 30 August to 1 September 2024. Further information about the festival
»EMPATHY« transforms the dehumanised Avenue of Nations into a human path of destiny. The victims of Buchenwald and other war victims seem to emerge from the anonymous stone and make contact with us. The three-part installation arouses a wide range of emotions and allows us to engage in a very personal dialogue with history and with our own reaction to violence, injustice and inhumanity.
Area Composing – Catching the spirit of places
»Darkness and silence in the room. One second later the wall in front of me has changed into a hyperreal landscape with incredible luminosity. Sounds from the four corners of the room. They do not belong here. Or do they? The landscape changes, dissolves into abstract forms that are impossible to grasp and again merges into ever changing views. I find myself in a sea of sounds and voices. Curiosity. Uncertainty. A melody appears. Relaxation. Seeing and listening become one. Colors get a voice, shapes begin to live, contrasts vibrate. Can I trust my perception? – Let go.«
Unique Video-Sound Installations
Area Composings are audiovisual installations of extremely slow merging images and a purpose-composed sound. Each video-sound installation is specially composed for the performance site and is not shown in this form at any other venue. The media artists Peter Hölscher, Ronald Gaube and Dorothee Pilavas record the images and sounds of the location with cameras, recording devices and all their senses and unite them to an audiovisual artwork. The sound reacts to the images – the images interpret the sound. The result is an inseparable combination of light art and sound art.
Digital art with innovative projektion mapping
Area Composing is digital art combined with innovative projection mapping. Precisely matched to the respective performance site, the media installations change the perception of buildings, squares or spaces and transform them into urban screens. Under bridges, on facades, in squares, in parks, on the water or in churches, museums, theatres, foyers, waiting rooms, showrooms – in public spaces the video-sound installations become audiovisual interventions, turn the audience into participants and invite them to interact.
Media art for immersing and slowing down
Unlike the often loud and fast urban screen projections or certain agitated light installations, an Area Composing has a decelerating, sometimes even contemplative effect. This is created by the perfect interplay of image and sound. The eye is almost unable to grasp the seemingly imperceptible changes in the extremely slow merging images. No sooner has the eye fixed on a detail than it dissolves again. This creates a completely different way of seeing, which deepens perception and allows the viewer to become truly immersed. The sound adds an emotional level of perception and triggers fantasies. Images arise in the mind in addition to the visible images – a profound moment of letting go and slowing down.