Official Selection

USA 2017
Duration: 06:45
Directed by: Melissa Ferrari
Animation: Melissa Ferrari
Technique: natural materials and pastel-on-paper palimpsest animation woven together with a multiplane and analog overhead projection.
Production/School: School: California Institute of the Arts (Experimental Animation M.F.A.)
Dialogue language: English

Phototaxis draws parallels between Mothman, a prophetic and demonized creature in West Virginia lore, and Narcotics Anonymous, the primary treatment program in West Virginia’s addiction epidemic. Rooted in nonfiction through a curation of archival text, this film contemplates synchronicity and the role of belief systems in perception; the tendency to assign supernatural meaning to tragedy and the unknowable; anonymous and apocryphal oral histories; and the moth to the flame. To visualize these narratives, natural materials and pastel-on-paper palimpsest animation are woven together using a multiplane and analog overhead projection.

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