Video Hailstorm (VHS)
Video installation.
Mengi, Reykjavík.
March 2016.
Video Hailstorm (VHS) uses early digital technology to zoom into parts of video noise – often called static or snow – to expose ever-shifting 'snowflakes' that make up the random image. The snowflakes are then treated further and recorded onto found VHS tapes to create flickering shapes and distinctly video-coloured compositions.
“The centrepiece was a wall of early-00s-looking TV sets, piled on top of one another and bolted together to creating a divider between the two halves of the gallery. This is Atli’s installation “Video Hailstorm (VHS)”—13 screens flashing with static of different shades. Some had shuddering spheres bubbling up and blinking away, others had twinkling diamonds of TV static. The colors were evocative of a printer test-page or TV test-pattern, and the gif-like repetitive cycles brought to mind something you’d see scrolling through Tumblr. The whole structure was captivating—even the back."
-Rebecca Scott Lord, The Reykjavík Grapevine