Flesh & Ghost
Total run time: 14:19
HD video, stereo, 2-channel, synchronous loop
Edition of 3, 2 AP
The poem and the myth in the eponymously titled two-channel video, Flesh and Ghost, share a resonance in their exploration of loss, memory, and the persistence of what has passed. In the Hočąk story, the twins Flesh and Ghost are born to the Moon and the Sun, but Ghost, the smaller of the two, is left behind at birth, abandoned beneath a tree while Flesh is taken and raised by their father. Though forgotten, Ghost does not disappear; he lingers, growing in the shadows until he and his brother are reunited. Yet their story does not end with reunion—it is defined by cycles of death and return. Throughout their journey, Flesh and Ghost repeatedly die and come back to life, often reviving each other after being struck down in battle or by supernatural forces. Their deaths are never final, reinforcing the idea that body and spirit are inseparable, bound in an endless cycle of loss and return.
This tension between separation and reunion, between presence and absence, is echoed throughout the text, where shadows take off beyond the horizon, leading to a past that still calls. The natural world in both narratives continues its cycles—winds shift, seas sigh, leaves fall—but only humans struggle against the churn, clinging to what is lost. The video's meditation on grief and memory reflects a truth in the myth–that which is lost does not disappear, it lingers as echoes, reverberations waiting to be heard again.
The video incorporates vhs tapes from Hopinka's youth, layering personal memory onto mythological`. One, taken from Hopinka’s first naming ceremony, marks a moment of identity and recognition. Another scene shows Hopinka with his younger brother. These fragments offer a past and a present, between what was recorded and what lives on in memory. What is persistent, what echoes, and is still shaping those who remember.