body vice

The starting point of the work body vice is the question of how people perceive their bodies in virtual space and the social construction of self-perception rooted in it.
Based on the theory of the body schema according to Paul Schilder, the work develops a virtual bodyspace in which the viewer is immersed. For this, Dominik Geis takes Schilder's "The Image and Appearance of the Human Body" literally when he dissects microscopic and documentary video recordings of anatomical details of the body and places them, assembled as a multiple grid in a video collage, in the virtual space and on the skin of the moving virtual figures in it. Accompanied by atmospheric rhythmic beats, this creates new perspectives of the body that would have remained hidden from the human field of perception without technical aids. Various scenes are created that guide the viewer through the body space generated and, by means of targeted guidance, lead back to or refer to his or her own corporeality and body perception.

The two-part work body vice contrasts the virtual with a real space. Two video projection screens prepare dramaturgically for the visual material of the VR work through the grid of the video collage and create a kind of backdrop for the wearers of the VR glasses.
An interplay between real and virtual imagery is created, which underlines and marks the performative moment and the presence of the body when viewing the VR work in analogue space.

Schilder acknowledged: As inseparably as our emotions and actions are connected to our own body image, we also unconsciously construct this body perception in dependence on our perception of others.
In body vice, Dominik Geis creates virtual image bodies and thus dissects the self-evidence of our everyday body schema, making the constructedness of it tangible in the first place. The question arises of the presence/absence of bodies in (virtual) space and the accompanying social design of one's own perception.

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

360° video + 2-channel video installation, two 16:9 projections, Vr glasses, sound, 6:00 min. 2022