The Compostelan Cycle is a video installation work with a duration of five hours and thirteen minutes. Modular in form, it consists of fifteen “chapters” each representing a stage along the four medieval pilgrimage roads to Santiago de Compostela through France and the single route across northern Spain.
The work encompasses all these pilgrimage roads, alternating landscapes and medieval infrastructure with a total of forty-two twelfth century Romanesque portals.
The portal sculptures are rendered in vivid detail through the use of hundreds of still images which have been transformed through the use of AI Technology in order to simulate fluid 3D camera movements, engaging the eye towards the detail of the highly varied narrative structures contained in each portal ensemble.
The Compostelan Cycle is, emphatically not a documentary on the subject of the Compostelan pilgrimage. Rather, it is a rendering of an imaginary journey making use of the remaining extant materials of the medieval pilgrimage, contemporaneous with the writing of the twelfth century Latin text commonly known as the Pilgrim’s Guide.
Images of ancient roads, bridges and monastic edifices are coopted into the service of a mythological psychogeography, whose principle element is the stone carved Romanesque church portals along the routes.
The stone sculpted images of these portal programmes originally described spiritual themes in symbolic form. A primary purpose behind the Compostelan Cycle is to create an experiential piece aimed at accessing the multiple symbolic layers of meaning in that sculpture, allowing its oneiric qualities to breath fully.
Separately, the work questions the way time and place are represented on film and proposes it’s own solutions.
The duration of five and a quarter hours is intended to equate with the scale of the journey itself which, counting all the five routes, covers a total distance of over two thousand miles. The viewer is invited to experience the work as though they were travelling along it, not knowing what lies beyond the horizon before passing through another portal onto the next stage.
An original music score by Martin A. Smith combines with the visuals to form a unique journey through time and space.
Optionally, the film is complemented by an installation featuring a selection of photographs of Romanesque sculpture from sites along the routes and a printed series, in A1 format, of illustrated essays on the theme of the legends of Charlemagne which are associated with the early development of the medieval pilgrimage.
The modular structure is non linear and allows for the showing of individual “chapters” as separate entities of shorter duration than the complete work as well as the possibility of viewing the Romanesque portal sequences as individual standalone pieces.
The film is a digital file MP.4 of 56.77 gb and has a duration of 5 hours and 13 minutes
The artwork is a series of 35 A4 photographs. There is an A1 sized illustrated map and three map collages one of which includes a running order for the film. Additionally there are 10 AI printed illustrated essays. Please note that the artwork is optional depending on space considerations.
Trailer of 4’19” is available for viewing at https://vimeo.com/1045980063
A 25 minutes section is available for viewing at https://vimeo.com/943147987 (n.b. password is compostela)
The Compostela Cycle is produced by Georges Meisner
Previous Screenings:
La Galerie Chouette, Caunes-Minervois , France September 2023
XYZ Gallery, Grays Inn Road London November-December 2024
Awards:
Merit Hispanic International Film Festival 2024
Outstanding Excellence Religion Faith International Film Festival 2024