PERSONAL WORK

Toru - Cartier with support of the Maison
CASEY

Shortlist

Title of Piece:	Toru
Client/Brand:	Cartier with support of the Maison
Production Company:	CASEY
Director(s):	Carlo Van de Roer, Taika Waititi
Producer(s):	EP: Patrick Casey HOP: Caroline Klimerman LP: Kim Comeaux
DoP:	Mike Berlucchi
Instagram Tag:	@carlovanderoer @wearecasey @satellitelab @taikawatiti @ritaora @pccasey @stuetr @mikeberlucchi @olivierwicki @cartier
Short Synopsis:	New Zealand artists Carlo Van de Roer and Taika Waititi collaborate on 'Toru', a three channel video installation. Inspired by the significance of Tokotoru, or Trinity, in Maori culture, the work weaves together themes of unity -- earth, sea, sky -- and references to mythology, including the Maori myth of Tane retrieving three baskets of knowledge -- the basket of light, the basket of darkness and the basket of pursuit. Each film operates as a different recollection or interpretation of the same performance. A new filmmaking approach called PlateLight enables the filmmakers to capture the same moment with different lighting conditions as separate pieces of footage. This results in three versions of the same film, presenting a record of the past as photographically accurate, yet fluid and authorable, visually embracing a tension between veracity and fluidity in storytelling. Toru draws inspiration from the embrace of art and technology in the Light and Space movement of Southern California where the work was created. The set was designed to present a changeable representation of place through lighting and references to architecture. The project was shot in Los Angeles, not far from where Robert Irwin and James Turrell experimented with the perception of space and material through light. In a physical space, the films are presented on three screens as a triptych. Online the work is presented as interactive, giving the viewer control over the lighting. The film-making technology used to create multiple films of the same performance was developed by Satellite-Lab, an R&D studio co-founded by Carlo Van de Roer and Stuart Rutherford at the New Museum to develop new in-camera based film-making approaches, maintaining the integrity of a real performance and real lighting in the face of a movement towards artificial filmmaking approaches.