AU-DELÀ DU DÉSERT FLOU, PLUS AUCUNE SAUVEGARDE N’EST POSSIBLE
digital video/machinima (1920 x 1080), color, sound 43’, 2021, France
Created by Elisa Sanchez
“I’m tired of playing cowboy” says Elisa Sanchez, referring to her experience with Red Dead Redemption 2. To spice up things, she uses cheat modes and modifies the original game. And so she discovers weird architectures, bizarre landscapes, and bottomless rivers, among other things. Her metaphysical journey into the Wilder West to escape her “house arrest” due to the Pandemic lockdown becomes the stuff of legend. The result is a slow, contemplative, meditative machinima situated at the intersection of video art, video essay, and video diary. A warning: if you cross the blurred desert, you won’t be able to save your progress.
Born in Toulouse, France in 1997, Elisa Sanchez is likely France’s most well known artiste-astronaute and a recent graduate of the Haute école des arts du Rhin Mulhouse, Strasbourg. In 2021, she completed her thesis project entitled Le Cowboy et Le Astronaut under the supervision of Anne Foret. Her first machinima, Au-delà du désert flou, plus aucune sauvegarde n’est possible, was screened at the international film festival Cinéma du Réel in March 2022.