O EARTH
by Seamus Slattery
Seamus Slattery is a video artist and writer currently residing in Brooklyn, but originally hailing from outside of Philadelphia. His work takes the radical possibility of queerness as a lens through which one can begin to re-imagine interactivity, memory, and environments both constructed and natural. He is interested in how media and politics surrounding visibility and representation have the possibility to renegotiate conversations of care, intimacy, and identity. Often, the work that Seamus creates centers on movement, nature, and little things that he thinks might have special powers. Formalities aside, all he really wants to say is: "take care of yourself!!!"
“O EARTH” was created for our rough draft presentations during the Spring 2023 Capstone class. We were asked to put our thoughts and feelings revolving around our capstone projects into words and images in order to share with our classmates for the first time. I collected videos of nature that I had filmed over the course of about six months, and played with various post-production techniques to disrupt the footage. The voiceover was created from words that I had written during the development of my final project for capstone. The intention was to modify personal footage, words, and even my own voice to work towards an affective practice. My hope is that something is felt by the viewer as they let the video wash over them. My process is to prioritize honesty through critical fabulation, or altering something in order to make it feel more authentic―making different to make real, realer, realest.