Next Step builds on top of my experimental narrative project Want. I've been fascinated by my experience at the ironworks while shooting Want, and have experimentally manipulated both unused and used footage I captured there. I've been particularly fascinated by witnessing the display of Humankind's will, and it's struggle with the universe, presented in a very tangible way; it speaks to all of your senses at once.

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We may very well be a key ingredient in the next evolutionary steps of intelligence. In other words, we may potentially be able to cause intelligence more complex than our own. This is a scary notion since we often don't relate kindly to beings whose intelligence we perceive to be inferior to ours. With Next Step, I meditated on the idea of causing a more complex intelligence not for the sake of power or advancement, but rather for the sake of heritage.

 

I've repurposed the footage to create imaginary settings and patterns belonging to an imagined system that's iteratively trying to further intelligence. We are no longer around, but having known about our coming demise, instead of leaving behind megalithic structures, we leave behind a giant computer capable of improving, manipulating and manifesting itself.