With Love / Fetle Wondimu Nega and Amy Manson

With Love is a short work exploring the reciprocal connection between sound and visuals. Heavy on bold patterns, punchy beats and moody vocals, the film progresses from dark to light, sparse to chaotically colourful, soulful to upbeat, reflecting our innate tendency to move towards hope, optimism and joy. We wanted to have fun with it, making something both emotionally resonant and technically explorative and experimental. Amy used strata cut animation, shaping clay into patterns layered within a log shaped sculpture. As the log is sliced the animation is created, each slice revealing a frame. As much as it takes a lot of thought and planning, the results are often unexpected and joyous. Reflective of the notion that as much as we can plan and stress and worry, life will always surprise us. In response to the dark and light stratacuts, Fetle produced a piece that transitions from moody to upbeat, expressing the sharp entrapment of self-criticism to the release of self-acceptance. She developed the sound through playful experimentation hoping to, within the process, let go of encroaching self-critique. She started by collecting samples reminiscent of the tactile nature of clay, eventually layering them with vocal chops from various unfinished songs and voice memos. Making something new, and in the process accepting materials that had once been thrown away.