Metabolism
Eugenia Lim, film stills from Metabolism, 2K single-channel video, colour, sound, 29:15. Courtesy of the artist and STATION.
archived
18 May
–
8 Jun
Eugenia Lim
A portrait of a living, working ecology and the multi-species it sustains, Metabolism is a film essay that considers the body-as-land and land-as-body.
Filmed around the site of the Western Treatment Plant (WTP) in Werribee, Victoria, Australia, Metabolism considers metabolism as an ambivalent process that connects external and internal forces: from chemical energy-creation within our bodies, to capitalism’s ‘metabolic rift’. For the Wadawurrung people, Wirribi-yaluk (Werribee river) is the backbone and spine of Country, a waterway that has sustained life since time immemorial. Wirribi-yaluk runs along the eastern edge of the WTP, a living and flowing entity connecting old ways with new. Since colonisation, the land, waters and air of this place have been drastically shaped to produce and metabolise food, waste, energy and water. New housing developments with names like ‘Riverwalk’ and ‘Manor Lakes’ spring up within smelling distance of effluent ponds in an ongoing process of birth, death and renewal. Through multiscalar ‘ways of seeing’, in Metabolism, bodies are porous and interconnected—from the microscopic to the planetary.
Created across seasons, in dialogue with the site-as-protagonist, Metabolism considers the interdependencies between human and more-than-human bodies, interior and exterior ecologies, and the consumption, colonisation and capitalisation of body-as-land.
CREDITS
Director, Editor, Producer, Writer - Eugenia Lim
Cinematographer - Tim Hillier
Composer, Sound Designer, Mixing - Carolyn Schofield (Fia Fiell)
Drone Operators - Trent Perrett and Glenn Hester
Production Coordinator - Bianca Chang
Wadawurrung Cultural Advisors - Stephanie Skinner and Corinna Eccles
Performers - Lee Wan and Harshanie Habarakadage
Western Treatment Plant Operations - Peter Kissonergis
Melbourne Water Heritage Advisor - Paul Balassone
Colourist and Post - Chris Tomkins
Title Design - Amery Oke-Johnston (Thought & Found)
Sound Mastering, Recording Engineer - Pat Telfer
Artistic Advisors - Amos Gebhardt and Gabrielle Brady
Metabolism was filmed on and in the lands, waters and skies of the Wadawurrung. We pay our deep respect to the sovereign traditional custodians of this place for their deep, ongoing practice of care for country, kin and culture.
Commissioned by Public Art Commission, Deakin University and the City of Wyndham. Presented by PUBLICS.
Eugenia would like to thank: Peter Kissonergis, Paul Balassone, Catherine Rees, Lee Wan and Harshanie Habarakadage at Melbourne Water; Trisha-lee Donavan at Wadawurrung Aboriginal Corporation; David Cross, Cameron Bishop, Simon Reis and the Public Art Commission team; Paul O’Neill and PUBLICS; Amelia Wallin, Anu Pennanen and Stéphane Querrec; Gabrielle Brady and Amos Gebhardt for creative support; and all her Metabolism collaborators, human and more-than-human.
Past Event
Openings: A koru is a trajectory by Heidi Brickell & Metabolism by Eugenia Lim
Enjoy is pleased to present A koru is a trajectory, an exhibition by Heidi Brickell (Ōtaki, Aotearoa), and, Metabolism, a film by artist Eugenia Lim (based in Naarm, Australia, on unceded Wurundjeri lands in the Kulin Nation).
More info
Eugenia Lim, film stills from Metabolism, 2K single-channel video, colour, sound, 29:15. Courtesy of the artist and STATION.
Eugenia Lim, film stills from Metabolism, 2K single-channel video, colour, sound, 29:15. Courtesy of the artist and STATION.
Eugenia Lim, Metabolism, 2K single-channel video, colour, sound, 29:15. Installation view. Courtesy of Cheska Brown.
Eugenia Lim, Metabolism, 2K single-channel video, colour, sound, 29:15. Installation view. Courtesy of Cheska Brown.
Eugenia Lim, Metabolism, 2K single-channel video, colour, sound, 29:15. Installation view. Courtesy of Cheska Brown.
Eugenia Lim, Metabolism, 2K single-channel video, colour, sound, 29:15. Installation view. Courtesy of Cheska Brown.
Eugenia Lim, Metabolism, 2K single-channel video, colour, sound, 29:15. Installation view. Courtesy of Cheska Brown.
Eugenia Lim, Metabolism, 2K single-channel video, colour, sound, 29:15. Installation view. Courtesy of Cheska Brown.
Eugenia Lim, Metabolism, 2K single-channel video, colour, sound, 29:15. Installation view. Courtesy of Cheska Brown.
Eugenia Lim, film stills from Metabolism, 2K single-channel video, colour, sound, 29:15. Courtesy of the artist and STATION.
Eugenia Lim, Metabolism, 2K single-channel video, colour, sound, 29:15. Installation view. Courtesy of Cheska Brown.
EUGENIA LIM
Eugenia Lim is an artist of Chinese-Singaporean ancestry who works across body, lens, social and spatial practice to explore how migration, capital and encounter cut, divide and bond our interdependent world.
Based in Melbourne, Australia, on unceded Wurundjeri lands in the Kulin Nation, Lim has shown at the Tate Modern (GBR), LOOP Barcelona (ESP), Recontemporary (IT), Kassel Dokfest (DE), Museum of Contemporary Art (AU), ACCA (AU), FACT Liverpool (GBR), Kunsthal Charlottenborg (DK) and EXiS (KR). She co-founded CHANNELS Festival, co-wrote and hosted Video Becomes Us on ABC iView and is a former co-director at APHIDS. Lim has been artist-in-residence with the Experimental Television Centre (NY), Bundanon Trust, 4A Beijing Studio, and Gertrude Contemporary. Lim is a 2022 Sidney Myer Creative Fellow and winner of Charlottenborg Spring’s 2022 Deep Forest Art Land Award. In 2024, Lim is an AIDC Leading Light, a Frame Documentary Lab participant, and one of 10 international directors selected for the prestigious Berlinale Talents Short Form Station. Eugenia Lim is represented by STATION.