Since mosaic typically requires a cement base to secure the individual fragments, it is unusual to find the medium in stop-motion animation, a technique that requires components to move a microscopic distance in each frame.
But during a ten-day residency in Tarusa, Russia, a group of artists worked with the partnership Invisible friends decided to try the unconventional approach. The result? ‘The sky has no edge’, a poetic story about looking up that consists almost entirely of mosaic.
Conceived in five days and filmed in the same time, the dreamy animation flows through a patchwork of scenes conceived by individual artists, all of which are then stitched together. There’s a crow perched on a power line that promptly devours a fly, red and orange fireworks burst in the distance, and a bee buzzes high above a train as it speeds past.
To create the film, artist Ilya Yudovich came up with a plasticine mixture with sand and other materials. The resulting substance retained the texture and consistency of cement without hardening. Invisible Friends shares an in-depth look behind the scenes his website and adds:
The animation process was very labor intensive. In some cases it resembled cutout animation, where a large, pre-prepared mosaic image was moved under the camera and underwent minor changes. Sometimes it involved complicated work with the entire image – a form of total animation. Each frame required meticulous attention to detail, as if the mosaic was being reconstructed anew.
It contains a useful translation of the film’s story YouTubebut you can find more experimental techniques and collaborations from Invisible Friends at Vimeo.
