deep dive room
aragats, armenia
2022
deep dive room is an immersive space-specific installation with video and audio documentation, accompanied by a cassette audio release by facial agnosia composed explicitly for the installation and being its integral sonic component. the installation itself consisted of several sessions that took place in 2022 in a former lecture hall with an altar made of objects found on the site-stones, bones, grasses, pieces of wood, and metal assembled into one volumetric composition. from one perspective, they are assembled in such a way as to remind one of chaos; from another, they add up to perfect order and harmony-echoing the theme of duality that runs through the whole body of anya she’s work. heavy on symbolism and inspired by alchemical transfiguration, the work is an amalgamation of science and ritual that acts on various levels of perception. inseparable from the image is the sonic part of the installation: a cassette recording of an awareness meditation mixed with field recordings from the mountains.
a meditation on sensing the space, then oneself, and finally oneself in that space, guided by the performer. to achieve a total immersion in the suggested state, the sensory and olfactory channels of perception are also involved. deep dive room is a meditation on the intersection of the physical and spiritual planes, a search for obscure meanings and interconnections by means of introspection and reimagining the surroundings to catch that transcendent moment of clarity, shift one’s perspective, and experience time differently.
video by anya kholina