Sandia

Mélissa Faivre / Germany, France / 2025 / Czech Premiere / 7 min.

synopsis

The Sandia Mountains in New Mexico, located on the eastern edge of the Rocky Mountains, combine steep snow-capped cliffs with the aridity of the desert at their base. This visual portrait of the landscape, in which the mountains come alive, pulsate, and transform, is accompanied by an audio mix of extreme temperatures and songs of the Pueblo tribes who have lived here since time immemorial. Techniques based on the tradition of experimental film, such as frame by frame copying, painting, collage, and engraving into the material, draw the digital image into a visual trance.

“Mélissa Faivre’s work is immersive, hallucinatory or even vertigo-inducing, depending on your reception, or possibly your viewing experience. They are rich in colour, movement and associations. The films are based on camera images, and on photographs reproduced frame by frame and layered with video images via compositing and montage creating new imaginations. […] The montage reaches a level of multi-dispersion that seems to be pure fantasy; at the same time it has a potential to trigger your individual memories and associations.” — Walden Kunstausstellungen

Source: http://www.galerie-walden.de/INFECTED%20REALITY-english.pdf

biography

Mélissa Faivre (b. 1989) is a French video artist based in Berlin. In her work with digital formats, she builds on techniques used in analogue film experimentation. She is the author of Songs for Being Alone (2014), The Becoming (2020), The Day the World Went Away (2023), and other videos.