We are two molecules floating together in space and our distance is infinite… then the sound of birds

2018, performance with stones; single-channel digital video, colour, sound, 16:9, 5 min 26 sec, edition of 5 + 1 AP.
Performers: Emma Fielden and Hanae Utamura. Videographer: Orkhan Huseynov. Location: Art Omi Artists Residency, New York, USA.

We Are Two Molecules Floating Together in Space and Our Distance Is Infinite… then the sound of birds is a video performance made in the studio during Fielden’s residency at Art Omi. Hanae Utamura and Emma Fielden sit facing one another, encircled by separate rings of stones. Through a slow, shared action, they begin to move the stones inward, drawing them from their separate perimeters toward a central point between them, gradually dismantling the boundary that defines their separation.

This work marks a key moment in Fielden’s practice, her first performance and first collaborative work. It established an ongoing engagement with two-person actions, video and performance as key modes through which questions of relation, distance and shared space are explored between bodies. 

"In the video, the two women sit facing one another, surrounded by two circles of stones and staring into each other’s eyes. Slowly, seemingly through some unspoken signal or cue, their hands float behind their backs. They begin to delicately scoop the encircling stones forwards, collecting them one at a time. As their hands travel towards the front, they push the stones up into a mound between them. The markers that defined their separation have been broken down and intermingled. They may not be together, but no longer are they so far apart.”
- Nadia Odlum, The only certainty is transformation: Emma Fielden’s changing states, The Art Life, November 2018.

“What is the distance between two points, between two stars, two mountains, two stones, two humans? Like two points in space or two points in time, can individuals ever really coexist in a mutual psychological space of true understanding? Can we get inside another person’s head, or are we ultimately separated by an infinitely divisible and uncrossable void?”
- Emma Fielden, 2018.

Below: Installation at The Lock-Up for An Immeasurable Distance, 2019. Photographer: Document Photography.