it's a beautiful day too bad it won't last and neither will you...
video editing and spatial design for Ella Wasserman-Smith's performance
full performance at University Settlement in New York City, December 2019
“It’s a beautiful day too bad it won’t last and neither will you” was a movement collaboration facilitated by Ella Wasserman-Smith and created in the year following the untimely death of her father. Through using the body as a primary source, we experimented with visual and audio storytelling, paraphrasing, and approximating. Drawing upon the theory of landscape memory, we created a unique and one of a kind environment, attempting to capture the spirit and presence of Ella’s late father. Through the use of projected videos - one playing on the wall behind the dancers as seen in the performance video, and the other one projected upwards into the space changing the lighting and perception of the space itself. The reality was both central and dislocated within the dance, as the development was very much rooted in freeform exploration and improvisation. Personal histories and perspectives collided w with out limited collective imagination for fantasy and grief.
Overlapped videos of Ella - the choreographer and facilitator of the entire project. One is a video of her riding across the Manhattan Bridge, the other one is from one of the improv sessions during the development stage of the project. Together they create a beautiful metaphor of coming to terms with loss through movement, allowing oneself to feel everything from melancholy, through anger to joy. A reminder that it is a journey, one of many.
A collection of looped and layered recordings from the rehearsals and improvisations, with manipulated colors, contrast, and style.
A result of freeform experimentation in Adobe After Effects, used during the performance to change the colors and light in the performance space by being projected upwards into the space.
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