Pandemia by Pandemia, single channel video, sound, 7 min 29 seconds, 2020 part of the national programme ‘Covid-19 Responses’, supported by @aceagram. Format Festival 2021, Covid Collection Museum of London, 2021
I met Andrea in February 2021 – on Zoom of course, not in real life. I had almost got to see some of her Virtual Reality (VR) work in the summer of 2019 (The Forest of Query) but illness intervened. I knew about Andrea from a good friend, performative writer Veronica B. Veronica B both wrote the script and was the narrator for The Forest of Query. I was fascinated by the worlds that Andrea and Veronica B create and the VR technology which enables the viewer to enter into and explore the 3D landscape. Andrea populates the forest with characters: part human, part beast, part mythological magical creatures constructed from cut and folded photographs. Dr Elizabeth Day, Systemic Psychotherapist, Supervisor and Consultant
I was excited to see Andrea’s film ‘Pandemia and Pandemia’, an enquiry into travelling during Covid 19. As I watched I thought how interesting it would be to include it in the Pandemic as Systemic Flux website. Folded figures cut from photographs speak about the experience of travelling during the pandemic. The noise of tube trains drawing in and out of stations provides a background which is inescapably resonant for anyone who travels in London. I was at the Private View of the Grain Project’s ‘Covid-19 Responses’ virtual exhibition and Andrea introduced her film. She spoke about her fascination with people in transit and the anxiety of beginning to travel again after the first lockdown in the UK ended. She interviewed people but couldn’t get close to them. The bubbles seem to act as a relational metaphor for the distance/closeness that has been a feature of our lives over the last year. The track in the film connects us while social distancing enables us to speak but not touch.
This project was made possible thanks to a GRAIN-Projects https://grainphotographyhub.co.uk/portfolio-type/covid-19-responses/ bursary, part of the national programme ‘Covid-19 Responses’, supported by @aceagram
