hidden and missing things | 2020
16:9 | 15’39” | stereo | color
audio in finnish | subtitles in english
In collaboration with coreographer Heli Keskikallio
In my recent research called ’hidden and missing things’ I’ve been emphasizing the spatial and sensory aspects of the practice of Dowsing. Also referred to as divining or water witching, dowsing is a form of divination that uses a forked stick, rod, or pendulum to locate mainly underground water and involves a practice of foretelling the future through various natural or psychological techniques.
By understanding the hypothesis which this ancestral practice of divining rods serve as a medium between the human body and the magnetic fields throughout that flow the environment, the dowsers would be directly affected by physical signs, that even could be described as ‘supernatural’ signs, inferring them to follow in one direction and not the other, e.g.
As a locative technology that is often just a branch cut from a tree, the divining rod has a deep and tortuous history tied to elemental, mythical, and spiritual forms of spatial orientation. Positioning this technology as an antecedent to contemporary forms of locative media calls attention to a range of neglected and alternative imaginations that are tied to these network devices.
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