Jungle Trap by Keagan Klempel adds to the ongoing conversation around the Anthropocene and built environment. This work looks at a section of the Tūtaekurī River in Hawke’s Bay, created from a base image captured by drone then digitally manipulated to evoke a sense of mystery and unease.
Taking inspiration from the uncanny, this work is a response to Sigmund Freud’s experience of being lost in a provincial Italian town, going round in circles seeing the same elements over and over, making the whole situation feel uncanny. Jungle Trap is meant to place the viewer into this loop, where the viewer may imagine themselves following this road but coming up against the same elements again and again, with each instance being slightly different to the last via reflections and inversions.
Jungle Trap also add to the conversation on the Anthropocene and our built environment, looking at how we as humans inhabit and develop our natural landscapes. The work looks a section of bushland next to the Tutaekuri River where a paths have been created where vehicles and humans have regularly travelled through. By applying concepts around the uncanny, the work acts a distorted reflection on reality, extrapolating the visible effects we’ve had on the environment.