Infected
Gina Czarnecki
2005
Infected is a film by Gina Czarnecki about the nature of the physical body in the context of future technological possibilities, seen through dance and digitally manipulated imagery. The new bio-engineered body is still an sexual, organic, stark, brutal, pounding system. It is beautiful, repulsive, indulgent, curious, emotional, un/controlled, breeding, changing…
Infected begins in darkness; a small streak of light expands into a series of more complex shapes, revealing itself as the body of a dancer. Confined within a circular projection screen the dancer moves with the distracted, disorientated impatience of a caged animal. As the film progresses, the image is manipulated until flesh takes on an almost liquid appearance. The figure stutters, jumps, blurs, is broken.
Is this a futuristic vision of the human body infiltrated and changed, ‘infected’ by biotechnology? Or is the reverse happening? Is the human body, the warm-blooded body of sinews and emotions, corrupting the ‘pure light’ of technology?
- Credits
—Infected was created by Gina Czarnecki in 2005. Produced by Forma. Supported by Wellcome Trust Sci-Art Award.
Infected features Scottish dance artist, Iona Kewney, and a specially commissioned score by Christian Fennesz.
Gina Czarnecki realises her art in a diverse and often unconventional range of media, including installations, sculpture, video, and site specific works. Since the mid-1990’s her work has found fascination with convergent developments in life sciences and technologies, their possible applications and how this shapes and informs identity.
—
Background image: Gina Czarnecki, Infected, 2005