Vivaria

Overview

A haunting new dance-based video work from Samuel James stages bodies against surreal surrounds, exploring the psychological and physical dimensions of places.

Vivaria means literally 'place of life', but generally refers to enclosed areas where plants or animals are kept for observation or research. Within this hypnotic four-screen video installation, vivaria are shuffled and flipped like a child's toy blocks, allowing us to peer into strange and surreal worlds. These worlds are familiar yet not, urban places twisted into Escher-like repetitive architectural structures or fantastical landscapes. Within them, human figures appear, often tiny and seemingly overwhelmed by their surrounds, isolated and somehow disjointed. Soon, we realise that their strange movement is in synchronicity with their environment and, in moments where movement conjoins with architecture, we see that these humans have somehow adapted and become one with these alien places.

The dancers involved are Martin del Amo, Peter Fraser, Linda Luke, Georgie Read and Lizzie Thomson, Sydney-based artists who are all incredibly unique, and this work reveals the great depth of their talents. Gail Priest's post-apocalyptic soundscape is a perfectly suited and carefully unobtrusive echo of the visual aesthetic.