Woman on a Swing, 3min., color, sound
In this project, Reichert and Liss explore the relationship between movement, sensation, and subject in cinematography. The video depicts a young woman on a swing; a classic motif suggesting light-hearted and carefree youth, ephemerality, desire, buoyancy. The subject is seen from behind in an intentionally indeterminate setting, which allows/enables the viewer to project and/or identify.
Although she swings back and forth, however, she always remains in the same location within the frame, and the same distance away from the viewer. The movement and scale of the surrounding frame changes as if the movement is transposed from the subject to the camera frame. This optokinetic stimulation induces a physiological phenomena known as vection, the illusion of self-motion.
The red color of the woman’s dress was chosen not only for its symbolic and psychological connotations, but also for its capacity to increase human metabolism, respiration rate and blood pressure, further enhancing a physical sensation in the viewer.
Biographical Information
German-born conceptual artist Isabel Reichert explores the gaps left by early conceptual artists, specifically in the area where life meets art. She often collaborates with her husband Sean Fletcher and uses a variety of media including film, video and performance.
Her films have received awards from the Center of Art and Media (ZKM) in Karlsruhe and the German Public television (SFW) in Germany, and the Chicago Underground Film Festival. Her work has been featured on German television, Musée Cantonal des Beaux-Arts de Lausanne in Switzerland, at the Fluctuating Images festival in Stuttgart and the Israeli Center For Digital Art in Holon, Israel. Her film with Kerry Laitala has been showing internationally including the 8th New York Underground Film festival, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco and the MadCat Women's Film Festival, European Media Arts Festival in Osnabruck, Germany, and the Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley, California. Her work has been reviewed in the San Francisco Chronicle, and the German online magazine Der Spiegel, Stretcher.org and on KALW’s Artery. Isabel holds an MFA in New Genres from San Francisco Art Institute 1997.
Heike Liss was born in Düsseldorf, Germany. She studied Ethnology and Social Anthropology at the University of Tübingen. In 2002 she received her Master of Fine Arts from Mills College. Her work has been shown in places such as Mousonturm, Frankfurt, Fluctuating Images, Stuttgart, Musée d'Art Moderne et Contemporain, Strasbourg, Fnac Galerie and Goethe Institut, Marseille, Les Laboratoires d'Aubervilliers, Paris, Antimatter Festival, Victoria, Onetake Film Festival, Zagreb, New Museum School, Boston, Arts Commission Gallery, San Francisco, Armenian Center for Contemporary Experimental Art, Yerevan, Fotosommer Stuttgart, MOFFOM, Prague, Oakland Art Gallery, the Armenian Film Festival, San Francisco, CUE Art Foundation New York City, and many other locations. She has collaborated with a variety of artists, which include choreographer François Verret, composer and musician Fred Frith, multi media artists Michael Trigilio, Ellen Lake and Nomi Talisman, as well as poet Lyn Hejinian. She is the recipient of a Jack and Gertrude Murphy Fine Arts Fellowship at the San Francisco Arts Commission, a Fellowship at The International Photography Institute, New York City, and was nominated for a Zontas Art Award in 2007. In 2008 she was artist in residence at the Experimental Media Arts Lab (EMA) at Stanford University. Liss works in video, photography, site-specific installation and public intervention to explore day-to day life. In recent years she has also acted as a curator. Heike Liss lives in Oakland with her family.
The soundrack was composed by Jason Hoopes. Jason is a bassist/multi-instrumentalist, improviser, and composer living in the San Francisco Bay Area. He attended Mills College where he received both a Master of Arts degree in Music Composition and a Master of Fine Arts degree in Performance and Literature.