More than Meets the Eye - Christoph Oeschger

Christoph Oeschger

More Than Meets the Eye: Capturing Invisible Flows and Processes: For my doctorate, I created four films and one photo-text installation that engage with invisibility in various ways. My research for the film "2°", which seeks the impact of human interaction with changing geographies, took me to an altitude of 3,500 meters above sea level. In my investigations, I traveled as far north as the 51st parallel to produce the film "In the Ice, Everything Leaves a Trace", and the photo series "The Other Side of Ice", examining the economic exploitation of the Arctic. My research also led me to a place where the wind is harnessed for filming, inspiring the creation of the film "Memories of a Past Future", and to a location where filming is no longer possible, yielding images used in the production of "Unlearning Flow". The decisive events of our time are often not visible. My research revolves around making this invisibility negotiable. These occurrences possess a fascinating duality, simultaneously feeling both familiar and foreign. While we are intimately connected to them, they represent global processes that escape complete comprehension. They are complex chains of causality that have become inscrutable to individual perception. Invisible events cannot be addressed through individual images or shots. Instead, it's the montage techniques of demontage, soft montage, and the productive gap that I employ. It is these working methods that allow me to approach the invisible, partially capture it, and make it negotiable. These forms of montage are also mirrored in the written part of my dissertation. The written section of the doctorate brings together various text elements that influence each other and create cross-references within the individual works. The the written part contains conversations with other artist researchers contextualize my work within my field but also to build a forum to negotioate my work.

In the Ice, Everything Leaves a Trace

As Arctic ice melts, borders shift once inaccessible places and resources become accessible, and new claims to raw materials and territories are made. The Arctic is changing like never before, from a romanticized image of wild, harsh nature to a technological place full of economic interests. The Arctic has become a hotspot of border shifts and geopolitical interests. The essay film In the Ice, Everything Leaves a Trace is a poetic approach to this place and makes the invisible visible.

In the Ice, Everything Leaves a Trace is the first outcome of joint research of the author Gianna Molinari and the artist Christoph Oeschger.

Title: In the Ice, Everything Leaves a Trace

Year: 2023

Length: 13’ 07”

Director: Christoph Oeschger / Gianna Molinari

Camera: Christoph Oeschger

Editing: Christoph Oeschger

Voices: Achim Barrenstein, Natascha Kuch

Sound Design / Music: Fabian Gutscher

Translation: Simon Cowper

Audio: Stereo

Format: UHD Video

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