Walking from physical to digital within Deep Waters

This article looks at how Deep Waters, a commissioned site-specific installation for three screens, animation and sound, was shaped by the 2020 travel restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic. Rather than drawing a halt, the work brought forth a Practice as Research (PaR) methodology enmeshed in technologies of virtual reality (VR) but extending outside of the VR headset for its exhibition. The processes and subsequent documentation of Deep Waters are explored here through Vilém Flusser’s concept of the ‘apparatus’, while asking the questions: how can an animation practice evade pandemic restrictions through moving in-between multiple screens, frames and windows? What may the documentation of an ephemeral praxis reveal, beyond acting as evidence that the work took place?