Reise der Schatten | Yves Netzhammer

Follow the hand

What if Giorgio De Chirico’s paintings were simply  “stills” from a metaphysical film of himself? Yves Netzhammer’s filmic «journey», Reise der Schatten, made me think of these kind of suggestive phantasies – which would also apply to some surrealist paintings indeed. Yes, because a minimalist approach to figuration, to scenery, and to the choice of gestures and movements, together with the creation of an alphabet of symbols to be read through free associations, are the “classical” ingredients of the characteristic visual language of this Swiss artist. The minimalist style lets the digital animation self-reflectively emerge as a visible medium, which is almost “shown” as such, and conveys the constructive pleasure of animation as manual modelling and manual development. Just to add another self-reflective layer: the protagonist of the film is nothing but a hand …

«Adventures and misadventures of a hand» could be the subtitle of Reise der Schatten. Thus, the journey of the two apparent protagonists, a modular-like couple torn between love of the Other and love of Oneself, is actually following the journey of the hand – the true protagonist – as well as its absence, or its prothesis. I like to see the hand as the figure of Netzhammer’s art-making (clearly based on hand drawing), where the intentions and the possible meanings of his creations follow the adventures and misadventures of the process of creation itself. That’s why this filmic journey does not want to say something, to tell one story, to communicate one message, but invites us to follow the plural and open paths that the creative hand explores. From this perspective, the absent hand, the prothesis and the several amputations and wounds, are all figures of desire, of the unknown that makes the journey truly explorative. Reise der Schatten is a trip, but not an Odyssey, nor is Dante its model, even if we are allowed – and somewhat invited – to think of these classical models (the myth of Orpheus or some biblical tales will equally be evoked).

However, the ombre (shadows, Schatten) – be they otherworldly or just projections of our worldly presence – are at the core of the phantasy of the film. One could feel Netzhammer’s world to be oneiric or metaphysical, but probably just a precise description of our inner forum, the forum of our thinking, of our feeling. The cosmos of Reise der Schatten is probably just the space of our introspection, where the modular-like human protagonists will embody the homunculi who explore it. We know that in introspection there is no room for rhetoric but only for sincerity, cruel sincerity. The stories of the film are then akin to a wordless inner monologue that hosts both tenderness and violence (the inseparable elements of sexuality) at their most intense levels. This highly emotional thread both enriches and disturbs the existential meditation of the film, one that will never turn abstract, and this is the paradoxical strength of minimalist animation, when it is well done: its ability to enhance sensibility. Wonderful colours and elegant music complete the task, so that the film reaches the perfect and beautiful cruelty of existence.