Annie Berman

Utopia 1.0: Post-Neo-Futurist-Capitalism in 3D! 20 mins. Color. Stereo. HD. Cinemascope. 2015. USA. is a first-person expedition to Second Life, the once thriving virtual 3D online world, in search of what remains - ruins that do not decay, speculative real estate, realtors' offices, wide open spaces with 'for sale' signs, Harvard University’s virtual ‘sandbox’, and an art gallery on its last days. Given the invitation to come build anything imaginable, what is it that we chose to create? 

The film is a first-person expedition into the once thriving world of Second Life, an online virtual world launched in 2003. 

A fully immersive version also exists for the GEAR VR created in collaboration with the NY VR Lab, prototype for Oculus developed at Art-a-Hack summer residency with Dave Tennent and Lee Tusman.

The concept of virtual reality speaks to the past, present, and future role that technology has in society, often forcing us to grapple with our notion of progress and the uncertainty of what new innovations will bring. In Utopia 1.0: Post-Neo-Futurist-Capitalism in 3D!, filmmaker Annie Berman sends her avatar into a vast online virtual world, whose population has dwindled from millions to thousands, to investigate what parallels can be drawn to our ‘real’ world in the wake of economic collapse and uncertainty, as well as subsequent political movements and upheaval.

PAST SCREENINGS INCLUDE: 

MoMA's Doc Fortnight / IMPAKT Festival / Kasseler DokFest / Antimatter / Roma Cinema DOC / I-Docs / Films of Note

Contact: info@fishinhand.com
Electronic Press Kit

The concept of virtual reality speaks to the past, present, and future role that technology has in society, often forcing us to grapple with our notion of progress and the uncertainty of what new innovations will bring. In Utopia 1.0: Post-Neo-Futurist-Capitalism in 3D!, filmmaker Annie Berman sends her avatar into a vast online virtual world, whose population has dwindled from millions to thousands, to investigate what parallels can be drawn to our ‘real’ world in the wake of economic collapse and uncertainty, as well as subsequent political movements and upheaval.

 SUBJECT AREAS INCLUDE

Film | Cinema | Media | American Studies | Game Studies  | Art | Economics | Political Science | Science & Technology | Architecture & Urban Planning Philosophy | Sociology | Anthropology | Innovation

“Utopia 1.0 is at once thought-provoking, emotionally riveting, and envelope-pushing in its exploration of the intersection of contemporary culture and technology.” –Caveh Zahedi, Professor of Culture and Media Studies, The New School

"There is irony and sadness in that, now in decline, the virtual mirror-world of Second Life reflects the remains of our abandoned malls, bankrupt civic centers and old industrial parks. Annie Berman takes us there via her avatar to see for ourselves what remains in Utopia 1.0 her sly commentary on social relations, property and commerce in virtual space. Most utopian communities fail, but not without offering important lessons to future generations when they try anew." –Peggy Ahwesh. Professor of Film and Electronic Arts, Bard College

“I screen Annie Berman's Utopia 1.0 as part of my advanced new media studio class for undergraduates called 'Spaceship Earth.' The class addresses creative projects in imaging the scale of the planet from the urban to the galactic, and the often hybrid material and virtual forms they take. Utopia 1.0 sparks rich discussions about embodiment and spatial navigation in virtual worlds, as well as the social constructs of class, capitalism, race and inequality that accompany us into fabricated spaces. The video surfaces with humor those deep anxieties of the performance of the self online within asymmetrical power dynamics within which young people struggle to navigate today.” –Caitlin Berrigan, Professor of Emerging Media, NYU Tisch School of the Arts 

This appeared inside a video game console during the Utopia 1.0 VR exhibit at Babycastles Gallery, NYC, Aug 12, 2015. It aims to contextualize 3D as a constantly evolving perception.

This was projected during the Utopia 1.0 VR Babycastles exhibit, August 12, 2015. This series of images aims to provide an overview of the online world of Second Life. 

To complement the Oculus Rift film experience, a selection of in-world photographs by Marco Manray featured in the film are presented in Viewmaster and Keychain photoviewers.

Lee Tusman, Annie Berman, and Dave Tennent (pictured from left to right) comprised the design team that transformed Berman's original film to the immersive VR experience during Art-a-Hack 2015 at ThroughtWorks NYC. 

A virtual film by Annie Berman. 8 mins. HD. 1920x1080. Color. Stereo. 

WINNER, Best Experimental Film at RIFF Rome Independent Film Festival 2014

Set in New York City's famed West Village, but 'shot'  within Google’s mapping application, STREET VIEWS explores how virtual mapping alters our experience of space and identity. With humor and a light touch, Berman attempts to navigate a surreal, disoriented new landscape.

OFFICIAL SELECTION: Rooftop Film Festival NYC; Northside NYC; Currents New Media Festival, Santa Fe, NM, June 2014; Rome Independent Film Festival March 2014; Art project TGD10, Dakar, Senegal, Dec 2013; Cucalorus 19 Film Festival, Wilmington, NC; FIDBA, Buenos Aires International Documentary Film Festival; Cyprus International Film Festival; Corinthian Peloponnesian International Film Festival; Symposium on Emerging Documentary Practices, Temple University, Apr 2015; The International Video Art Festival of Camagüey, Cuba, Mar 2015; Galerie Patrick Ebensperger, Berlin, Germany, Feb 2015; Symposium of The Performance and Interactive Media Arts (PIMA) program at Brooklyn College, Practicing Resourcefulness: A Collaboration With Circumstance, NY, Feb 2015; Jornadas de Reapropiación, University of Chopo Museum, Mexico, Oct 2014; Antimatter [Video Art], Vancouver, Fall 2014; Kasseler Dokumentarfilm und Videofest, Kassel, Germany, Fall 2014.

CONTACT: Fish in the Hand Productions. info@fishinhand.com

STREET VIEWS Program Notes by Marta Palacios Anaut, Kasseler Dokfest 2014

"I used to walk around taking pictures. I now find myself walking around in pictures" says Annie Berman,as a starting point in her video art work named STREET VIEWS. A stroll through frozen moments captured and conserved in a google street view map of West Village in New York City. Gliding through the map, the viewer gets an impression of everyday life street scenes on a sunday afternoon in this exquisite part of New York City, frozen in a moment.

Berman’s stroll is accompanied by side stories, that appear like short excursions from the actual route. The words of a doorman she recently met leads the viewer to the residential building where he works every night. While the "dérive" - as the artist calls her excursion - continues, the virtual eye walks through the streets using big steps. "Click - click - click" is the rather silent and discreet sound of these massive movements. Most of the people passing by along the way don´t know that in the moment of the capturing they become like a virtual sculpture - immortal as part of the virtual world.

"Is the face really our most identifying feature?" asks the voice starting to imagine how these people are, how they might live and what they might be interested in. Passing through the walls of buildings along the way the artist tries to get closer to the people. She is looking for the video store in this virtual world but gets lost by trying to communicate with the things that appear on her stroll. What she wants to get close to, vanishes. The protagonists and things appear and disappear, as the camera can only catch one moment.

Time by time the camera is accidentally reflected by the environment in a window screen or a mirror. A modern and for the person behind the camera perhaps rather unconscious reference to old paintings where the painter has depicted himself - becoming immortal through his own image. By seeing traces of the camera the illusion of the virtual world suddenly becomes unreal. We begin to understand that we only see through the virtual eyes of a certain perspective.

In her work, Berman is looking for the video store. But actually she is looking for intimacy and emotions, which she can hardly find in the cold virtual world of a google map. In the end, she finds at least a trace of what she is looking for. Commenting it satisfied: I love you, too!

-Marta Palacios Anaut

HD. B&W. STEREO. 23 MINS.

OF BIRDS AND BOUNDARIES is an animated documentary short that tells the story of ‘Marty’* a 25-year-old Hasidic family man in Brooklyn, who, yearning for freedom from his community, escapes into his own fantasies, and onto Craigslist, where he meets Annie, a secular filmmaker seeking a Hasidic researcher for her next project. What follows is the development of an unexpected relationship between two unlikely collaborators.

*At 'Marty's' request, his name has been fabricated and his voice altered to protect his identity.

This film was created as a filmmaker in residence at the UnionDocs Filmmakers Collaborative for nonfiction with Laura Mayer and Matthew Yoka. It has screened at UnionDocs, the Harvard Film Center, The Boston Jewish Film Festival, The Washington Jewish Film Festival, and Anthology Film Archives. A variation of the piece exists in the form of an installation that was installed at the Ildiko Bulter Gallery at Fordham University as part of the LIVING LOS SURES project at the 2014 New York Film Festival Convergence showcase. In 2014, Love + Radio podcast broadcast a radio version of the piece. 

A short stop-motion video about the relationship between wardrobe and gender. 1999. 

A short video about female desire. 1999.