COMING SOON

A hypnotic cinematic journey through deserted, architecturally charged landscapes—where dust, structure, and nature collide.

Claws, 2025, DCP 4K/2K/video projection, 5.1 surround, 38:07 min., ed. 5+1AP

Claws is a cinematic work exploring the tension between built structures and natural topography. Filmed in various regions of China, the film moves through largely empty, architecturally charged landscapes shaped by construction and dust.
Without dialogue and unfolding in a slow, contemplative rhythm, the camera traces human curiosity, greed, and spatial presence—revealing a visual afterimage of intervention and expectation.
Maintaining a deliberate distance, Claws creates subtle friction between observation and stance. A choreography of space and presence emerges: where absence resonates, structures impose, and nature responds.
As the final part of a trilogy on human-shaped environments, Claws reflects on the aesthetic and political dimensions of transformation—how landscapes become sites of desire, memory, and uncertainty.

Credits:
Script, DOP, Editing: Aurèle Ferrier
Sound Design: Peter Bräker
Third Eyes Editing: Sandra Bühler, Eman Hussein
Colorgrading: Dominik Zietlow
VFX: Gregg Langlois
Production: Aurèle Ferrier

Support:
Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia
Canton of St.Gallen, Arts Council / Swisslos
City of Zurich, Cultural Affairs, Covid Work Grant
Erna and Curt Burgauer Foundation
Foundation Anne-Marie Schindler
Stanley Thomas Johnson Foundattion
Gwärtler Foundation
Else v. Sick Foundation

Transitions, 2017, DCP 2K/video projection, 5.1 surround (no dialogues), 13 min., ed. 5 +1AP

Transitions is a journey from the civilizing void of the desert to a maximal urban, capitalistic and hedonistic density, which in the case of Las Vegas assumes some bizarre expression. The film is a contemplation without any people or moving machines in it, focussing on the built and designed.

«The work Transitions (2017) by Aurèle Ferrier examines the traces left by human civilisation – the conquest of the unwelcoming hostility of the desert ends in the surreal and hedonistic consumerism of Las Vegas. The camera leads us, with a menacing langour, through a backdrop of deserted city-outskirts. The buildings, cars and  billboards speak of people’s dreams as they strive for a version happiness. The prevailingly eerie, apocalyptic mood draws you along on this filmic journey. These traces of humanity seem increasingly laughable and helpless, they vibrate with a peculiar melancholy. Where have the people disappeared to? One has the impression a catastrophe has occurred, an epidemic, or maybe it is simply an empty film set after a shoot?
The film with its calm and assured grasp on image and sound is able to produce a refined suspense. The film takes the viewer on an odyssey, one that could also be a metaphor for the boundaries of human endeavor. The human culture and civilisation that emerged from the desert, will in the end be desert again.»
Laudation by Esther Eppstein & Elodie Pong, Winner Videoex 2017

Credits:
A film by Aurèle Ferrier
Sound design and foley artist: Peter Bräker
editing consultants: Sandra Bühler, Andreas Müller
Third eyes: Anna Hilti, Thomas Galler
Post production: Gregg Langlois, Noé Marti
Poster design: Krispin Hée

Support:
Kulturförderung Kanton St.Gallen (fine arts commission /film commission)
Volkart Stiftung
Ernst & Olga Gubler-Hablützel Stiftung

Infrastructures, 2014, DCP/video projection, 5.1 surround (no dialogues), 23 min., ed. 5+1AP

Infrastructures involves a journey through a landscape of infrastructures that are common to an everyday reality of routine. Yet here we find these environments are deserted. This allows attention to focus instead on the design and spatial arrangements of the objects, we find the features of these landscapes – which would not usually bear noticing – become centrally present.
The film involves a series of seven tracking shots. A steady flow of objects in various contrived arrangements passes by the eye. The sound design incorporates the subtle noises given off by these ready-to-use sites devoid of users. Produced in Dolby Surround, the soundtrack both evokes the physical experience of the location and creates a dialogue with these structured spaces and the arrangement and design of the objects therein.

«A pensive and serene vision that challenges the audience to consider and reevaluate not just the structure of film, but also the world in which we live.»
Jury Statement 2016 Slamdance Film Festival — Grand Jury Award

Credits:
A film by Aurèle Ferrier
Sound design and foley artist: Peter Bräker
Steadicam shots: Bergsteinn Björgulfsson
Image post-production: Noë Marti
On-site assitance: Anna Hilti, Esther Mathis, Stephanie Hess, Andreas Mueller, Katherine Patino Miranda, Ari Björn Ólafsson, Sigurður Þórarinsson, Ida Emilie Sabro Jensen, Sandra Lang, Bettina Diel, Christoph Oeschger Sarah Kaur, Dalia Huerto Cano, Lixin Bao, James Meyhew, Verena Faisst
Mentoring: Alex Arteaga, Laura Arici, Jörg Huber, Ulrich Görlich
Third eyes: Anna Hilti, Esther Mathis, Andreas Mueller, Robert Steinberger

Support:
Kulturförderung Kanton St.Gallen
Georg und Josi Guggenheim Stiftung
Erna und Curt Burgauer Stiftung
Georges und Jenny Bloch Stiftung
Mediendienst Kath. Kirche Zürich
Zürcher Hochschule der Künste
Steo Stiftung

NEWS

Claws, 38 min., expected completion in March 2025

Birds (working title), 30 min., expected completion date in January 2027