The video-environment Lava and Moss (in Icelandic Hraun og Mosi) was created in response to a call from Einar Mar, owner of the Icelandic Light Cliff Gallery, located in the Hafnarfjordur lava field, to create a work on lava on Steina Vasulka. The artist captured lava in the Icelandic landscape and then manipulated with the recordings in her studio with the help of digital instruments and in the rhythm of electronic sound composition. In the documentary, we can see three closely adjoining projection screens that cover whole wall of the dark space of the gallery. Intertwining images of rock, watercourses, Icelandic vegentation, as if by the impulses of electronic sound came to life. Their jerky movements gradually transform into a smooth movement of the fluid rolling in all directions and across the projection screens, then solidifies again to regain the force of the rolling stream a little later.

Author: Steina Vasulka

Year: 2000

Artistic medium: projected video environment
document capturing the gallery installation

Technical medium: Video: digital video, colour, sound, 15:09 min. Installation: three-channel video, three-channel audio, 14 min cycle.

References: BAROK, Dušan. Steina and Woody Vasulka. Monoskop.org [online] URL
VASULKAS. Vasulka.org [online] URL