Waterlife | ALN

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The Hypermedia Art and Literature Directory offers a detailed review of works in art and literature which use various forms of hypermedia.

Waterlife

Submitted by Joël Gauthier on Wed, 03/16/2011 - 09:27

Author(s):

Gauthier, Joël

Fiche simple

Waterlife est un imposant documentaire interactif réalisé par Kevin McMahon à propos des Grands Lacs. Il s'agit avant tout d'un documentaire écologiste, questionnant nos habitudes de vie et leur influence sur les réserves d'eau potable mondiales.

Le documentaire est divisé en plus de 100 segments. Pour passer d'un segment à l'autre, l'internaute peut utiliser une interface où chaque segment est représenté par une miniature intégrée à une mosaïque représentant les Grands Lacs. Il peut aussi se servir d'une barre de navigation au bas de l'écran, composée de petits traits bleus correspondant à chacun des extraits. De plus, une liste d'hyperliens thématiques est disponible dans le coin supérieur gauche. Il suffit que l'internaute passe le curseur de sa souris sur l'inscription "WATER IS >" pour qu'elle apparaisse. Plus simplement encore, deux flèches placées dans le coin inférieur droit permettent de parcourir linéairement le documentaire, segment après segment.

Chaque segment est composé d'une variété d'éléments différents: témoignages audio, films, hypertextes informatifs, photographies, schémas animés... Le plus souvent, pendant que des films défilent en arrière-plan et que des témoignages audio se font entendre, l'internaute est invité à parcourir à son rythme un ensemble de notes présentées sur des petites cartes ou des fiches. Il est aussi possible de masquer le texte pour mieux visualiser les extraits vidéo. Plusieurs éléments ludiques sont intégrés aux interfaces pour amuser l'internaute: trombones que l'on peut pousser d'un côté à l'autre de l'écran, blocs Post-It à feuilleter, etc.

La trame sonore de l'oeuvre est constituée de pièces de Sam Roberts, The Allman Brothers, Dropkick Murphys, Sufjan Stevens, Sigur Ros, Robbie Robertson, Daniel Lanois, Phillip Glass, Brian Eno et The Tragically Hip. L'internaute peut sauter d'un morceau à l'autre en cliquant sur le lien "MUSIC".

Finalement, une liste de liens complémentaires tout au bas de l'écran permet d'accéder à une sélection de ressources communautaires pour la protection des Grands Lacs, à un texte de présentation général du projet Waterlife, au témoignage du directeur et à l'horaire des projections publiques du documentaire, présenté à travers le Canada.

Waterlife

Artist·s:

McMahon, Kevin

Kind of Artwork:

Internet

Year:

2011

Anciennement accessible sur waterlife.nfb.ca

Infos

Hosting website:

National Film Board of Canada

Hosting website URL:

http://www.nfb.ca/

Project organization:

National Film Board of Canada

Date of last consultation:

March 16, 2011

Groupe de recherche:
NT2

Taxonomies

Nature:

Artwork

Interactivity:

Position Tracker, Image Manipulation, Multiple Choice Navigation

Format:

Image, Animated image, Music, Sound/Soundscape, Text, Animated Text, Video/Film/Short Film, Voice

Theme:

Activism, Documentary, Water, Ecology, Politics, Testimony

Media:

Internet

Année:

2011

Artwork language(s):

English

Citation(s)

THERE IS NO CLINICAL TRIAL DATA ON THE LONG-TERM EFFECTS OF THESE TOXINS. As Nort Americans rely more and more on medications, both prescribed and over the counter, the toxicity levels in the water are rising. These medications are travelling directly through the body and flushing straight into municipal bodies of water, contaminating local watersheds. Most of the chemicals found in the Great Lakes have only been tested in trace amouts. There is no clinical trial data, as of yet, on the long-term effects of these toxins. Recent studies have shown disturbing changes in wildlife and human cells in concentrated areas with high toxicity levels. The identification of these chemicals in the Great Lakes is a matter of grave concern for many. The Great Lakes contain the last major supply of fresh water on the planet.

Notes

Waterlife is a co-production between the National Film Board of Canada and Primitive Entertainment Inc. The film tells the epic story of the Great Lakes by following the cascade of its water from northern Lake Superior to the Atlantic Ocean, through the lives of some of the 35 million people who rely on the lakes for survival. Providing Earth with 20 per cent of its surface fresh water and its third largest industrial economy, the Great Lakes are a unique and precious resource under assault by toxins, sewage, invasive species, evaporating water and profound apathy. They are also one of the planet's great preserves of extraordinary wilderness beauty and a bounty of unique species. Waterlife blends these realities with a dreamlike fluidity as it pours the lives of some amazing characters. We meet an Anishinabe medicine woman who walked 17,000 kms around the lakes to sympathize with them; the last of the great Michigan fishing families; a man whose lakefront home now borders a field thanks to sewer overflows; the people of a village where mysterious toxins ensure that most new babies are girls; and the residents of Love Canal, a notorious Niagara Falls neighborhood abandoned in the 1970s and now, dubiously, refurbished. Along the way, Waterlife shows viewers the Great Lakes as they might appear to a seagull, a fish or a water molecule... and from a myriad of other amazing perspectives. Filmed over a full year with a battery of specialty cameras and techniques, Waterlife provides an unprecedented view of an incredible ecosystem rarely seen by the city dwellers who form most of its population. From the ornate fountains of Chicato to the sewers of Windsor, viewers are carried through marsh and pipe, across pounding waves and through thunder clouds on a journey which, as the film says, has no "ending or beginning, that shapes every body it passes through and unites them all across space and time." Waterlife's director Kevin McMahon is one of Canada's most innovative documentary filmmakers, and its producers include Mark Achbar, creator of the controversial hit The Corporation. Gord Downie, leader of The Tragically Hip and a Lake Ontario Waterkeeper, narrates Waterlife. Topping off this epic cinematic poem is a fabulous soundtrack featuring Sam Roberts, The Allman Brothers, Dropkick Murphys, Sufjan Stevens, Sigur Ros, Robbie Robertson, Daniel Lanois, Phillip Glass, Brian Eno and a new song by The Tragically Hip. Primitive Entertainment is a Toronto based production company specializing in documentary feature films, television series and factual entertainment. Over the past 20 years, Primitive Entertainment has produced some of Canada's most daring and successful feature documentary films and documentariy series. Working with a diverse range of international and domestic broadcasters, programs from Primitive Entertainment are recognized for their integrity and high production values.

Biography

McMahon, Kevin

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