Via Ferrata (ACCA) installation time lapse ACCA 2012

Time lapse footage of Dan Shipsides installing his work Via Ferrata (ACCA) for the Australian Centre of Contemporary Art’s exhibition, Desire Lines. (Best watched at 720p HD)

Via ferratas translates from Italian as ‘the iron way’. It was a military form of mountaineering developed during World War I. The techniques were often about establishing and maintaining frontiers by moving troops to strategic summits and into extreme positions through the use of metal wires and steeples. Amazingly, these also channel lightning strikes and audio waves from the summit skies to the valleys, like some strange form of atmospheric communication. As part of Desire Lines, Shipsides evokes this technique by climbing ACCA’s exterior and forming a line drawing in rope.

Desire Lines: A meander through art and life
5 December 2012 – 3 March 2013

Video Production: Emma Sullivan