Festival Commissions 2023
KAZ
2cm Below The Soil
Animated film, 3:30 mins | Interactive 3D digital artwork | Single player video game
KAZ
2cm Below The Soil
2023
2cm Below The Soil is an audio visual installation and surrealist immersive video game experience created and drawn by KAZ. The installation and game experience revolve around speculative depictions of the relationship between women and the soil based on their abilities to cultivate growth and sustain and maintain life cycles. Game players are guided through different ecosystems where they encounter the lifescycles of fictional arthropods and must forget the rules of their previous reality in order to progress through the game. The animated film consolidates the narratives and imagery in the game while the interactive 3D digital art work allows viewers to experience the game experiences of past players.
2cm Below The Soil uses speculative world building to play out a version of reality where cultivation, sustainability and maintenance of our planet and each other have sovereignty. Drawing on hermetic and Christian philosophical ideas of ‘as above so below’, KAZ brings players into surreal, subterranean ecosystems in order to explore how we can use microcosmic ideas of soil and insects to understand and experience macrocosmic concepts of harmony and interdependence on a universal level.
KAZ is an animator, illustrator and harpist. She completed a masters degree in Computational Arts at Goldsmiths, University of London where she specialised in animation, interactive fiction, and immersive experiences in games engines. She has a multitude of interests and just loves creating and experimenting whether it’s through art, tinkering with music or dance. The majority of her work is inspired by West African tradition and several other esoteric practices she has researched and been inspired by. As a Ghanaian born artist, her culture has always inspired her work, but after she moved to the UK at the age of 7 she began to explore new spiritual ideas and philosophies and deepened her meaning of ‘divinity’. At a core level her work explores finding your authentic self and living and creating from that space.