Defrost (Sula, 2021) is an interactive video installation which merges live footage from a webcam with Max/MSP programming. The core of the work incorporates the notion of melting. When spectators move in the monitored area, the image ”melts” into particles and changes. When there is no movement, the image returns into its original composite form.
The dissolving and reappearing manifested in the work refer to processes in nature: warmth and motion which result in changes in the climate, growth, decay and regeneration. There is no life without warmth and movement, though too much of them is harmful.
Anna Nykyri is a visual artist, documentary film director, and screenwriter. She lives and works in Helsinki. Nykyri holds an MFA from the Finnish Academy of Fine Art and an MA in Choreography from Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance, London. Nykyri uses moving image to create documentary films, cinematic video and sound installations, and choreographic environments. Her works often explore political and corporeal themes, covering questions of gender, power, and control. She has participated in a number of residencies such as ISCP, New York; Barbican Center, London; Cité des Arts, Paris.
Kaisu Koivisto lives and works in Helsinki. In her works Koivisto incorporates photography, sculptures and video into installations.The thematic focus of her artistic practice is rooted in the notions of place, history and landscape. Koivisto’s interests are rooted in the North, its landscapes and sociopolitical dimensions. Her interest in history leads her to explore abandoned Cold War era military areas in Eastern Europe. In her long-term project New Nuuk she examines the growth and urbanization of Nuuk, Greenland’s capital.
The working group:
Visual artists Kaisu Koivisto and Anna Nykyri, creative technologist and concept designer Marko Tandefelt and creative technologist Joaquin Aldunate.
The programming of the interactive part is generated by a Max/MSP patch created by Marko Tandefelt and Joaquin Aldunate, in collaboration with Anna Nykyri and Kaisu Koivisto, consisting of a real time videomixer, a live heat camera feed, as well as a custom Max/MSP particle patch created by multimedia experience designer and media artist Federico Foderaro, who granted the Sula working group an access to use and modify it for using it in Sula.
In collaboration with:
The Promotion Centre for Audiovisual Culture AVEK / Media Art, Arts Promotion Centre Finland, Arts Promotion Centre Finland / Uusimaa, Finnish Cultural Foundation and the City of Helsinki.
Special thanks to:
Pawel Janicki, Juuso Laatio, Risto Vuorenrinne.