Cloth: Here

"Here" is an AI short film fragment from the collection "Cloth", in which pale ectoplasm appears from mouths as a desired proof of connection at art events, echoing spiritist photographs. It presents an AI archive of our need for presence and connection, physically, digitally, but also emotionally.

The series presents five silent, 5-second AI-generated micro-films set in crowded art spaces. In each scene, a strange ectoplasmic substance slips from open mouths and noses, manifesting the presence of an artist, curator, or another figure we hope to meet. Directly inspired by early spiritist photography, the project functions as a speculative archive: the fluid reads as a search for evidence and, at the same time, an archive of a hoax. It asks what counts as proof when we say someone was there, sincerely or not.

These films draw on nineteenth-century spirit photography. In many examples, mediums used very fine cloth to mimic a thick vapor of a spirit. The cloth was moved around the sitter’s face or torso, or shown as if coming from the medium’s mouth, creating the effect of ectoplasm. Each image is created in Midjourney, trained on some of those very photographs, and then animated. Each sequence is rendered to imitate handheld footage, as if recorded without a stabilizer and guided by small bodily movements. Each frame carries slight shifts that suggest a person behind the camera. The films are silent to avoid imposing a musical, emotional reading before the viewer forms their own.

Cloth is an inquiry into what it means to be present today, not only physically or digitally but also emotionally and mentally. It reflects a deep need within art communities: the desire for proof that a bond was felt. These moving images hover between documentation and illusion, recalling historical cloths once believed to represent spirits. They test how easily evidence can slide into deception and how our longing for connection shapes what we accept as real.