The project "free immersion notes" is structured as a non-linear “journal” of relocations, reflecting on hoarding and haunting, memory, digital and physical accumulation, being out-of-joint and scattered and the “oceanic feeling”.
The story unfolds from the point of view of an unspecified character who has come unstuck in time and is training to adapt to the different timelines and dimensions (past, present, fictional, physical, digital), becoming amphibian and bodiless in the process. The narrative, fragmented in this way, thus coalesces into a kind of diving chronicle that links the vocabulary and metaphors of free-diving with the experience of digital space.
At her family's home on Symi, Myrto Vratsanou collected stories about the practices and traditions of sponge-diving, on which the island's economy once relied.
The film part of the project focuses on the surfaces and objects of the old house. Water as a carrier of stories is revealed in the corrosion of the oil-coated surfaces by the salty atmosphere of the sea.
"The bigger and heavier the body, the bigger and heavier the stone. The deeper the body of water." The essay and installation objects arise from this relationship between body, water, air, pressure, weight and object, functioning as fictional artefacts that hint at usage and at passing time.
Read the essay 'Free immersion notes' here.
'diver's house'
digital video, 15:24, 2021
A coproduction with the Kunsthochschule für Medien Köln.
Camera/Editing: Myrto Vratsanou
Colour grading: Ewald Hentze & Myrto Vratsanou
Sound design & composition: YARAY (Ghaith Qoutainy & Yara Said)
Filmed in Symi in the summer of 2019.
Presented in the context of the project 'free immersion notes' in the winter of 2022.
Thank you: Lilian Haberer, Ute Hörner, Angie Keefer, Maxine Kopsa, Karin Lingnau, Ursula Reber, Yara Said, Fani Schinopoulou, Lucy Skaer, Leni Speidel, Simon Villadsen, Eleni Vratsanou.
Supported by:
Kunsthochschule für Medien Köln
Onassis Scholarship Foundation
© 2022 KHM / Myrto Vratsanou
digital video, 08:24
(Editing of found footage:
“Journey To The Edge Of Space”
by SeekerVR, Youtube)
Bench
wood, recycled, unfired clay
Free immersion notes
RISO-printed publication & Designed by Matina Nikolaidou, published by Dolce Pub
Self-portrait/diving-stone
black Chios marble, tarpaulin rope
Apnoea
wood, PETG, nail polish, unfired clay, motor
Eyes
plaster, sand
Lungs
constricted glass, black slime (acrylic, glue, borealic acid)
Barotrauma
3d-printed, ear-shaped shelf, stainless steel bathroom elements, slime (black acrylic paint, glue, borealis acid)
Finger-tip
necrotic sea sponge, reinforcement mesh membrane, stainless steel bathroom elements
Plinth
wood, unfired clay, wax
research makeup of zombie-diver
(Concept: Myrto Vratsanou. Makeup: Insa Wagner. Developed in the context of Elio J. Carranza's Multiple Capaciousness)
Diving stones of Symi and how to hold them
(research stills)
Diver's house
(film stills)
Thank you,
Heike Ander, Anouk Asselineau, Axel Autschbach, Friedrich Boell, Elio Carranza, Aimilia Efthimiou, Lilian Haberer, Thomas Hawranke, Ewand Hetze, Ute Hörner, Jiha Jeon, Angie Keefer, Maxine Kopsa, Juliane Kuhn, Sepp Liebisch, Karin Lingnau, Vassia Magoula, Matina Nikolaidou, Ursula Reber, Fani Schoinopoulou, Yara Said, Lucy Skaer, Leni Speidel, Simon Villadsen, Eleni Vratsanou.