The Stones Only Appear To Be Non-Living
by Ana Laura Richter
Kamni so le navidez neživi, 2024, experimental, Virtual Cinematography, digital file, 1,77:1 (16:9), 60, c, 22 min
SI
Finished
The Stones Only Appear to Be Non-Living approaches the karst cave system of the Škocjan Caves as a temporally and materially multiple repository of climate history. The seemingly eternal cave unfolds within geological time as a zone of sensitivity, revealing the depths of the Earth’s crust. The river becomes the bearer of subterranean narratives, slowly flowing from droplets to the sinkhole. Through an explicitly slowed-down cinematic form, the work emphasizes duration, erosion, and non-human rhythms, positioning the cave as an archive of environmental and geological processes.
The film was created as part of an installation by the duo Swamp_Matter, which approaches caves and swamps as active, more-than-human spaces. Using a 3D scan of the cave, photogrammetry, and a speculative algorithm of stalactite growth, we sought to create a slow cinematic experience that enables the perception of geological time and non-human rhythms.