ARTEFACT
A funeral for obsolete technology. An ode to my Nokia 380.
Artefact is a ceremony for obsolete technology—a performance and art film that commemorates the mysterious phenomenon of brand disappearance from Blackberry, to Nokia, to Atari. It is a tribute to the immortal consumer icons we have internationally adored and the intimate and fickle ways we worship them. Artefact first took place at the Anti-Festival, Finland as a commission for the International Prize for Live Art. At this interdisciplinary event, the products that have formed us were farewelled with performance, sound, documentary and pathos. The inter-generational work was created with the community of Kuopio and featured some of its best loved choirs and death metal singers.
The Artefact film has also been screen at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image and the Perth Institute for Contemporary Art.
"The funeral will be a contemplation of what would be, if we gave objects the same value as a human being."
"Artefact commemorates the mysterious phenomenon of brand disappearance from Blackberry, to Nokia to Atari. It is a tribute to the immortal consumer icons we have internationally adored, and the intimate and fickle ways we worship them."
Original concept by Willoh Weiland
Created by James Brennan and Willoh Weiland
Music Direction and Original Composition by James Brennan
Cinematography and Editing by Kim Saarinen
Text for music by James Brennan with Anna Akhmatova, MS DOS, Jose Saramago and “Birch Bark Letter no 22”
Text for performance by Willoh Weiland and Emile Zile
Artefact designed by Willoh Weiland and Susan Cohn
Produced for ANTI Festival by Elisa Itkonen
Produced for APHIDS by Rosemary Joy and Claire Portek
Production Assistant – Anu Rantonen
Conductor and Score – Anna Antikainen
Video editing and operation – Matthew Gingold
Technical wizardry – Joshua Gardiner
Sound Engineer – Jari Tuomainen
Photography – Bryony Jackson
Graphic Design – Rebecca McCauley
Collaborating artists – Julian Crotti, Shocker_TV
Kovakivi Stone Company, Tampere
Alias Creative, Kuopio
Puijon Kivi Stone Company, Kuopio
Rosanna Funeral Home, Kuopio
Supported by HIAP international artists residencies, the Saastamoinen Foundation and the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body.
Following Artefact’s debut at ANTI Festival in Kuopio, Finland (2016) Aphids presents a screening of the work at Disrupted Festival of Ideas, at the Perth Cultural Screen, Western Australia.
