I Can See You
Film & AR Face Filters, 2020
The film looks at outsiders, women who live among others in villages and towns but aren't following the norm. They are different and people fear them. Fear them so much that they decide to accuse them of being witches. I Can See You takes inspiration from the witch hunt era in England, a local Lincolnshire book of folklore tales and beliefs, and theories around these women, particularly the following extract by Malcolm Gaskill.
'Witches are human. They are the other and yet they are also us. They are the living projections of feelings they defy rationalisation or reconciliation: amity and enmity, compassion and cruelty, self-confidence and fear’.
The film addresses today's behaviours, where individuals are blamed for the misfortunes of others, looking at the behaviours of ‘othering’: the ‘them and us’ approach, where we demonise and dehumanise the ‘inferior’ other group. It also explores contemporary behaviour and language, focusing on the immigration news during Brexit, the pandemic and online influencers.
The fictional narrative is based in a contemporary world with newsreaders, vloggers, experts and neighbourhood watch all creating a frenzy of fear and anxiety, referring to ideologies that started the witch hunt era, such as unusual weather and population increase, thus making people think irrationally.
The film fuses live-action, location footage, and archival materials with collage animation. The digital film also explores collage approaches, such as distortion, overlaying textures, erasing and cutting out footage.
The film and AR selfie face filters (for the museum's Instagram account) were created during a six-month artist residency at North Lincolnshire Museum and supported by North Lincolnshire Council and Arts Council England through the Humber Museums Partnership.
The face filters, inspired by the museum's taxidermy collections and witches' familiars, were exhibited as QR codes at the Mana Contemporary, Miami as part of Digital Art Month in association with Contemporary Art and Digital Art Fair. I Can See You film won Best Original Concept for experimental filmmaking at Jane Austen International Film Festival and received two Honourable Mentions by Experimental Forum and NFT|New Media|Experimental|Digital Arts Film Festival.
Credits
Music by Peter Richards
Tracy rose to the challenges of delivering an Artist in Residence programme during the first national lockdown for Covid-19, creating three fantastic artworks which we are proud to have on show in North Lincolnshire Museum. Each piece has interpreted the collection in a new and innovative way.
Rose Nicholson, Heritage Manager, North Lincolnshire Museum
