Bal na vodi (Dancing in Water). 2017. 2 minutes and 37 seconds audio visual drawing.

Bal Na Vodi (Dancing in Water) is a two-minute and 37-second audiovisual drawing. It is the outcome of a collaborative dialogue between artist Eirini Boukla and musician Barry Snaith. The work is a de/constructive, systematic approach to moving images through a linear and atmospheric narrative detour.

In this instance, I use tracing as a particular form of drawing to rework and repurpose found and already manipulated material. Taking up the diagrammatic potential of the moving image, ‘Bal na vodi’ edits traces over and reworks the motion lines from ‘Jolly Fish,’ a hand-drawn animation by Van Beuren studio in 1932. ‘A tracing’ here speculates on possibilities of place and memory and their representation through dynamic behaviour, movement, and other core elements of embodied experience.

Barry’s soundtrack accompanying Bal Na Vodi’s graphic dialogue emphasises the drama, rhythm, tempo, mood, or continuity in and between the images. It usefully and crucially creates space outside the frame. Sometimes, we are aware of the soundtrack, especially if a melody is recognised, but more often, it slips into our subconscious as perhaps it should if it is going there to retrieve a memory.