Project by Lucien Hinderling, Tim Rod & Timothée Verheij.
Interactive Installation with a pool, 2 loudspeakers, lights/projections at CabaneB, Bern (CH), October 2023.
Urgent Paradise is a project that delves into the multifaceted
symbolism of the palm tree in our cultural imagination,
particularly in the context of travel and escapism.
Through a combination of analog black and white images and
digitally manipulated collages,
Tim Rod documented his own travels and experiences, exploring
the intersection of technology and art.
Working in partnership with computational biologist Lucien Hinderling,
they utilized computer algorithms to create images of surreal
landscapes and palm trees that do not actually exist.
By training the algorithms on photos of Tim‘s own archive and
holiday pictures from online databases, Lucien generated a series
of dreamlike images that reflect our western gaze of a
perceived paradise, restoring the phantasm of the perfect
palm tree in our collective imagination from noise. Even if
these landscapes eventually vanish with progressing climate
change, in the virtual they will live on, with the machine
producing never ending variations of the fantasized Paradise.
Central to the space is the work « Perpetual Sunset”,
a sunset that is activated by pressing a button and bathes the room
in an evening atmosphere, reflected in the water surface.
The composed lighting not only immerses the viewers’ gazes but
also repeatedly transposes the surrounding photographic views into
the situation of an abstract snapshot. Timothée Vereji complements
this installation with a sophisticated system that determines the waves
in the pool through the movements in the space, thus affecting the
sound design as well as the reflections of light on the walls.
A chain reaction triggered by the visitors.
The resulting works capture both our own experiences and
our cultural idealizations and offers a unique perspective
through the intersection of technology and art, with the surreal
sceneries evoking an unsettling sense of familiarity and
longing.