Cross Currents axonometric view
Cross Currents was produced as an interactive installation and CD-ROM during the first phase of Del Favero’s Artist-in-Residency at ZKM in 1999. The interactive installation formed the first in the Produced at ZKM series while the CD-ROM formed the second in the ZKM Digital Arts Edition. In the interactive installation the viewer enters a room with a severely tilted and wedge-shaped floor. Interacting with the viewer’s movements is made possible by means of a laser motion detection system, which produces a split-screen video projection beamed onto the two intersecting walls of the room. The innovative laser motion detection system was developed by ZKM computer scientist Andre Bernhardt. The projection is accompanied by a synchronized sound and narrative audioscape, while fragmented items of hotel furniture emerge from the various surfaces of the space.
Cross Currents explores the traffic in human beings, specifically the sex trade, sweeping Europe and exploiting, amongst other victims, refugees from former Yugoslavia. These refugees, lured by false advertisements and enticements, find themselves forced to work as prostitutes in the hotels and streets of Berlin and other European cities. The work explores these issues through an interactive narrative dealing with the relationship between a young Croatian mail-order bride and her Serbian body guard. This narrative reconstructs the events leading up to a police raid on a sex slave hotel in central Berlin during which the woman escapes and her body guard and would be lover are killed. This reconstruction is enacted by means of each viewer’s individual trajectory across the space which triggers a series of cascading points of view including that of the man, the woman, their cities of origin and respective journeys to the imaginary refuge of Berlin.
- Overview
- Exhibition
- Credits
Project Director: Dennis Del Favero
Programmer: Andre Bernhard
Project Funding: Australia Council for the Arts
1999-2010
Interactive Video Installation. 15 minutes. BW. Stereo.
Two Channel Video. 15 minutes. BW. Stereo.
- IMAGINING MEDIA@ZKM, ZKM Media Museum, Karlsruhe, 2009-10
- In Search of Utopia, Galway Art Centre, Galway, 2009
- Global Priority, Jamaica Centre, New York; and Pier 2, Kaoshsiung, 2003
- Audioteque, Opera House, Sydney, 2003
- Electronic/Digital, Gertrude Posel Gallery, Johannesburg, 2001
- CLICK, Mildura Arts Centre Gallery, Mildura, Bendigo Art Gallery, Bendigo; Geelong Art Gallery, Geelong; Latrobe Regional Gallery, Morwell & Swan Hill Regional Art Gallery, Swan Hill, 2000
- Journeys into Dreamland, Ffotogallery, Cardiff, 2000
- John Curtin Gallery, Perth, 2000
- d>art, City Exhibition Space, Sydney, 2000
- Australian Centre for Photography, Sydney, 2000
- Kunstverein Rosenheim, Rosenheim, 1999
- ZKM Center for Art & Media, Karlsruhe, 1999
Producer, Director and Designer: Dennis Del Favero
Sound Design and Production: Tony MacGregor
Script and texts: Dennis Del Favero and Tony MacGregor
Sound Engineer: Andrei Chabunov
Audio Performers: Sylvana Jakic and Vladan Blagojevic
Translation: Margot Seligman
Yugoslavian footage: Drazen Simic
CD-ROM production and programming: Volker Kuchelmeister
Digital video editing: Dennis Del Favero and Volker Kuchelmeister
3-D graphics, video postproduction assistant: Sabine Hirtes
Installation application software: Andre Bernhard
Installation architectural drawings: Simon Bathgate
Researcher and script editor: Fiona Bathgate
The sound was produced in association with: The Listening Room, the acoustic arts program of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Recorded at: The Studios of ABC Radio, Sydney, Australia
CD-ROM production and digital video editing: ZKM, Karlsruhe
Presentation of Cross Currents courtesy Mori Gallery, Sydney