Vat (2005)

Overview

Manufactured items are ideas materialized. Vat, created from hundreds of actual objects performs a reversal: the artifacts emerge from all primal chaos into their ideal forms. The objects rotate continuously (the equivalent of an arcing camera), opening to reveal new spaces; as level upon level of impossible forms unfold. For the soundtrack, a recording of the ocean was literally played through all the strings of a baby grand piano. The results were used to excite the piano’s strings again and again, producing a variety of exotic tones and colorations. “McElwee has used his considerable artistic skills to magically transform everyday objects into an entrancing visual spectacle, simultaneously calming and intriguing to watch… gorgeous, hypnotic.” David Finkelstein, Film Threat