when you are close to me I shiver | Martina Menegon

when you are close to me I shiver (2020) is a virtual reality work generated in real time in which Martina Menegon expresses concern about the climate emergency that is affecting our planet. The artist creates a live simulation controlled by algorithms in which a female narrator with a tone of voice very similar to that used in documentaries describes a situation typical of a dystopian future, but not so incredible: masses of human bodies have gathered in the last limb of emerged land stacked on top of each other exhausted by the search for food and shelter. The artist drew inspiration from the serial documentary Our Planet and from the story of the walruses that live between the coasts of Alaska and Russia while the ice is gradually retreating due to the global warming.

Martina Menegon “when you are close to me I shiver” 2020. In-Game view ©Photo: courtesy of the artist

The global crisis has heavy effects on all living species and Menegon chooses to represent what could happen to humans: the characters of when you are close to me I shiver are low-poly clones of the 3D scan of the artist’s body, piled on top of each other, grotesque and touching.
This large and single collective identity shows the fragility of the physical and virtual body and the realities in which they move, in an even more disturbing atmosphere if we think about how much we still consider our living space, both real and digital, to be unlimited and sacred.

Martina Menegon, when you are close to me I shiver, 2020.
sound design: Alexander Martinz
Live Simulation / Installation
5 tablets, HD Display, Gaming PC
video, sound, indefinite duration