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NOUMINA presents a story, an abstract narrative, a cinematic journey through the cosmos. From a twinkly gaze at the stars, we are confronted with a presence, a geometric object, and are taken on a journey to its domain.
Through super hi-resolution images of the Universe, the participant experiences multi-dimensional layers, geometric viewports to other-worldly realities.
Accompanied by a hypnotic original score, the piece swoons and arcs over multiple moods and territories, finishing back at our home world, again at the gaze of ever-distant night stars.
'NOUMINA' is a hybrid of Kant's 'Noumenon' or 'non-object', and 'Numina', or 'Numen': the mythological idea that spirit is inherent in everyday things. Literally, NOUMINA could translate to 'The Soul of Impossible Objects': an impenetrable Other, the transcendental alien.
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I created the video installation NOUMINA for the Semantic Clutter event and Liquid Architecture Festival of 2010. The work was shown at West Space Gallery in Melbourne, Australia, from the 13th - 16th of July.
I'd like to shoot out a Super Thanks to Phip Murray, Lauren Brown and all the Westspace staff, Tessa Ellief for inviting me to exhibit in the show, Nat Bates - Liquid Architecture Director, Bianca Durrant for her help at the opening, and to James Wright & Will Hyndmarsh for help with video documentation.
Check out a few photos and a further project description below...
'Noumina', 2010
Multi-Channel Sound, Single Channel 1080p HD Projection, Dimensions Variable
18 minutes, 11 seconds, Infinite Loop
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Additional Audio Processing: Ry David Bradley
Consultant - Observational Astronomy: Michael Fitzgerald
Translation Assistants: Zane Lynd & Tomoko Yamaguchi
Installation Technician: Jonathan Hopkins
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There is an impossibility present for us in travelling the great distance of interstellar space: our nearest neighbouring star, Alpha Centauri, would take a gargantuan 180,000 earth years to reach with current technology. Yet, along with other significant scientific developments, such as spacecraft, it has been the camera which has provided the modern simian with the most acute and descriptive way of sympathising with the cosmic void, and of understanding our place within it.
Long before humans make any significant advancement in the physical traversal of worlds, it will be the continual advancement of optics - the ability to see closer, further and with finer detail - that we come to know the existence of extraterrestrial life by telescope alone. As sharp as the current Google Earth renderings of our home planet, we may one day zoom to other worlds with the same scale, resolution and quality.
2010 marks the 20th anniversary of the Hubble, the world's first orbiting space telescope. 'Noumina' presents our current visual rendering of the Universe via high-quality satellite imagery from NASA, and video improvisations from the open-source planetarium software Stellarium. Framed within alternate polygonal layers, the project attunes with the lineage of expanded cinema, and pays homage to the successes of astronomy thus far.
NOUMINA is part of an ongoing series of cinematic explorations of the Other, both formally and in its representation as alien encounter.
m. Leaf-tierney, 2010
