An Invitation to Disappear
Julian Charrière
Immersive video installation, 76 min 44 sec, loop / 4K color film, Ambisonics 3D sound / October 1–10, 2021
The immersive video installation Invitation to Disappear stages a psychosocial, transcendental techno rave amid the fields of a monocultural palm oil plantation in Southeast Asia, using fog, flashing lights, and stroboscopes. The linear camera journey through the dizzying vastness of endless rows of trees is accompanied by a hypnotic sound pulse combining natural sounds and techno beats, collaboratively developed by Charrière and the British DJ and producer Inland. This dystopian-melancholic film also marks the artist’s collaboration with philosopher Dehlia Hannah and can be seen as a response to the 200th anniversary of the iconic eruption of the Tambora stratovolcano in Indonesia, which plunged the world into darkness and caused extreme weather events — a climate crisis remembered in Europe as the “Year Without a Summer.” The delirium of the rave feels increasingly alien within the human-made grid of the plantation, condensing into a feeling of unease.
Credits
Direction: Johannes Förster
Soundtrack: Inland
Camera: Enrico Wolf
Lighting Design: Benjamin Tack
Camera Movement: Motion Compound
On-site Production: Mr. Bomb, Eakkawit Thampitak
Lighting and Sound Technology: Kenny Takewit and the FinalcutTeam
Philosophy on Site: Dehlia Hannah
Post-Production: broken bloke Production
VFX: Ioannis Kaltrimtzis, Tom Freeman
Field Recordings: Felix Deufel
3D Sound Design & Mixing: Felix Deufel