水托邦 Hydrotopia

In extreme cold, the human body can turn against itself through paradoxical undressing: failing nerves mistake freezing for heat, compelling the dying to shed their last protection. In 水托邦 (Hydrotopia), hydrophones frozen into a block of ice capture the material disintegration of their frozen body as a projected film gradually emerges into clarity.

The film follows artist Jamie Man suspended by hooks pierced through flesh in a British winter landscape, practising rituals rooted in Shiva-dedicated traditions that explore a state of perpetual non-being. As the ice surrenders its form and the image sharpens into focus, transformation itself becomes the subject: matter abandoning one state for another, the body held suspended between dissolution and emergence.

— Tim Leyendekker, WORM

Performance view at WORM, the International Film Festival Rotterdam (Photo credit: Matilde Gastaldo)

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Performance History