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The Fields of Nephilim

Part 2 Project 2012
Louise Cann
Oxford Brookes University Oxford | UK
The project reveals the individual’s eternal virtual identity in the face of the physical fact of death in the 21st Century, in the form of a tomb.

The resting places in the tomb connect the individual with the memory of the four allegorical figures, Dawn, Day, Dusk, and Night in Michelangelo’s Medici Chapel in Florence. The form of the four resting places is derived from the poses adopted by the four classical figures. They are placed within a space formed by translucent resin walls of varying thickness, which transmit light in accord with the time of day. The quality of the light matches that existing at the latitude and longitude of Whitby, Yorkshire where Bram Stoker’s Dracula came ashore.

The view from the resting places is derived from views within the human skull.

The structure that supports the four resting places is based on the construction of the soft tissue of the body, its tendons and muscles.

The genesis of the project lies within the contemporary Goth scene, with its elaborate codes of dress, with its emphasis on materials and detail, its theatrical air of gloom, and its poses to portray an identity that is classical in form. In parallel with this was a concern with the contemporary attempts of a family to access the personal digital social network records of a deceased relative.

The Nephilim is a Biblical reference to a race of giant angel human hybrids. The spatial experience is that of walking through parts of the body of a Nephilim. The project was thus developed both physically through resin casts and modelling of the human skull, and digitally mapping the soft tissue of the body. The construction of the resting places is of simple variable, detailed, grey ceramic components that slot one into another. The surface material of the resting places are tactile to the fingertips, covered in components that are shaped like computer keys.

Louise Cann

Tutor(s)
Prof Andrew Holmes

2012
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