Gone, Gone Beyond (US Premiere)

Recombinant Media Labs & Gray Area are proud to announce the US premiere of 360° spatial sound and surround cinema experience Gone, Gone Beyond by People Like Us (Vicki Bennett), following its debut European tour last fall with screenings at nyMusikk in Oslo, the Barbican in London, and more. Using edited collage, sewn together in a giant patchwork, Gone, Gone Beyond creates a seamless wrap-around audiovisual experience on the RML CineChamber's 10 screens and 8-channel speaker system. Pull on a thread and watch whole new narratives expand and unravel all at once on a 360° palette. The work's title and underlying concepts come from the Heart Sutra, a key Buddhist text, describing how all phenomena are empty in form yet ultimately interconnected. The last lines of the Heart Sutra say ‘gate gate pāragate pārasamgate bodhi svāhā’, which can be translated as “gone, gone beyond, gone beyond that a bit more, and then beyond that a bit further”. This reflects perfectly the action of going beyond the frame to where there are no edges to the narrative – just emptiness. Commissioned by Naut Humon, the founder of the RML CineChamber, the initial in-process tester movie for Gone, Gone, Beyond, was screened in San Francisco in October 2017 at RML’s own Recombinant Festival at Gray Area. This is Gone, Gone, Beyond's US premiere, following its European debut tour last fall with screenings at nyMusikk, Oslo; SPILL Festival, Ipswich; Attenborough Centre (ACCA), Brighton; and London Barbican. "Alternately – often simultaneously – irreverent and unsettling, celebratory and questioning, [People Like Us]'s work sparks outward curiosity and inner journeying." —Wire Magazine