Prossimo

Prossimo (Eng title: Forthcoming), 2020, Single-channel video, Belgium, 4 min. Synopsis May 2020, Limburg (Belgium). A peasant family is vaccinating their animals. Concept A spillover event occurs when a reservoir population with a high prevalence of pathogens comes into contact with a new host population. The human being is the only animal that could face self-extinction: in its desperate search for immortality, it has the ability to delve deeper into a process of modification of itself and of its surroundings. The aspect ratio of the work changes constantly and slowly until the images will become impossible to be watched by the viewer. “Make no mistake, they are connected, these disease outbreaks coming one after another. And they are not simply happening to us; they represent the unintended results of things we are doing. They reflect the convergence of two forms of crisis on our planet. The first crisis is ecological, the second is medical.” -David Quammen, Spillover: Animal Infections and the Next Human Pandemic “...the most serious outbreak on the planet earth is that of the species Homo sapiens” - Alan A. Berryman, The Theory and Classification of Outbreaks