FILMTHREAT.COM

"Artémis" is Valérie Morignat's "digital improvisation" to excerpts from orchestral and electronic works by Costin Miereanu. Miereanu's work generally creates a wash of sound, out of which notes appear like scintillating points of light, and Morignat creates a video well suited to the music. There are two layers of images: in the front, a texture is derived from ocean waves, shown at a slow frame rate and stylized into stars of white light over black, a nearly abstract rendition. Behind this layer, we see the twisting form of a nude woman, on whom some images are projected in red. When the music reaches an excited climax at the video's center, the figure of the woman becomes dominant, and her quickly twisting movements along with the rapid intercutting of images creates an agitated sense, almost of the meaty pulsation of life being born out of the primordial soup. At the video's end, the images of water return, this time contained within the woman's body. The video certainly evokes the mythological resonances suggested by the title, but it is mainly an experience of gorgeous images and lush music, enhanced by Morignat's consummate skill at manipulating digital video." > +