Living Dots and Glorious Dust: The Human Form Revealed in Unnamed Soundscape by Daniel Franke

Daniel Franke is an artist, designer and music video director who seeks to combine digital art with reality and thus extend our understanding of the world in which we live. In fusing the digital with the tactile, he creates stunning images, like this video, Unnamed Soundscape, which recreates the motion of the human body as a field of dots, or pixels. A dancer created with her body a representation of Kreukeltape, an ambient musical composition by Machinenfabrik. This dance was recorded by three cameras and reconstituted into a three dimensional cloud. The cameras themselves responded to the music by shifting their perspectives, further enhancing the multidimensionality already present.

Unnamed Soundscape is reminiscent of sand art and also reminds me of the computer generated images in The Mummy, which I have always found fascinating, although this is much more complex and haunting. The elegance, fluidity and transitory nature of the human form and movement are clearly illustrated. “From dust you came, and to dust you shall return,” it seems to say. What gloriously beautiful dust we are!