Gently Down the Stream
Still by Dries Verhoeven.
In the summer of 2021, Dries broke his hip socket in a cycling accident. For six weeks, he could barely move. Walking slowly on crutches, he created the video report Gently Down the Stream. Filmed on a smartphone, the video shows Dries attempting to identify with the slow-moving animals and other entities in his garden.
Gently Down the Stream is a cinematic meditation on fragility and the passage of time. The work was developed as part of Slow TV Cinema, a 24-hour programme of slow film curated by Anna Chrtková and Petr Dlouhý. It was screened at the Slow TV Cinema Marathon during SPRING in Utrecht, a programme inviting artists to explore film as a medium for reflection. By slowing down time and stripping the images of conventional narrative, Gently Down the Stream becomes a light-hearted vanitas still life.
In the summer of 2021, Dries broke his hip socket in a cycling accident. For six weeks, he could barely move. Walking slowly on crutches, he created the video report Gently Down the Stream. Filmed on a smartphone, the video shows Dries attempting to identify with the slow-moving animals and other entities in his garden.
Gently Down the Stream is a cinematic meditation on fragility and the passage of time. The work was developed as part of Slow TV Cinema, a 24-hour programme of slow film curated by Anna Chrtková and Petr Dlouhý. It was screened at the Slow TV Cinema Marathon during SPRING in Utrecht, a programme inviting artists to explore film as a medium for reflection. By slowing down time and stripping the images of conventional narrative, Gently Down the Stream becomes a light-hearted vanitas still life.