Future in the Past

Susanne Wiegner’s 3D computer-animated film Future in the Past takes viewers on a journey through virtual spaces populated by familiar objects and places that have been decontextualized and estranged from their proper place. Ships sail on a two-dimensional sea before falling over the edge; empty trains pass by electricity masts which tower up out of the water; terraced houses resemble artworks exhibited on scaffolding while lines the tracks, inaccessible and disused. The camera gradually zooms out, revealing that each of these spaces is merely a small part of a far larger scene. The spaces turn out to be open, peephole-theater type installations which are constantly transformed into new, larger spaces, in which earlier motives and objects are repeated. At the end, we return to the bathroom we began in.