The Liquid Ways of Sensing collection, released exclusively on Sedition, is part of the umbrella project Oceans Like Us. Oceans Like Us is an ongoing series of works that explore our multi-faceted, complex and often contradictory relations with the ocean - the liquid volume that covers over 70% of the planet we hubristically named “Earth.” Zurkow has been researching and working on ocean content since 2013 - from logistics to “becoming ocean,” through diverse media such as software works, audio works, print works, dinners, and snack shacks.

In the series of works created for Sedition, hand-drawn cell animation, found footage, and visual effects are intricately woven to create an eerie oceanic imaginary.

In Liquid Ways of Sensing—a collection of ten video loops—humans “sense” the ocean through rational and meditative observation, amniotic dreaming, and measuring. Amidst the delicate dance of jellyfish, dolphins, mantas, and schools of sardines, drift prosthetic sensing devices: remotely operated vehicles, fish robots, and wifi “skins” placed on marine animals. The hallucinatory effects of liquid light, vortexes, moires, and flotsam patterns disorient the loops, “fogging” the considerations of what it means to sense, who’s doing the sensing, and how complex the composition must be.

Credits:

Animation and editing: Marina Zurkow

Original sounds: Scott Reitherman

Animation assistance: Ewan Creed