Koyaanisqatsi
Out of Balance
A WORD ENGLISH NEVER MADE · READ THE CUSTOMS HOUSEHopi. Life out of balance. A world moving at a speed that no longer fits the living inside it.
The word
Hopi, commonly rendered as life out of balance, a state of living that calls for another way. Godfrey Reggio borrowed it in 1982 for a film with no dialogue, only accelerating footage and a Philip Glass score, because the word had no translation and the condition had no better portrait.
The feeling
The specific dread of speed. Everything works, nothing is right. Feeds refresh, traffic flows, the sky glows at midnight, and underneath it runs a low certainty that the pace itself is the disease. It is not personal anxiety; it is the sense of a whole system running hot.
Against its neighbours
Anxiety lives in one body and worries about a future. Koyaanisqatsi is a diagnosis of a world, felt personally. Dread waits for an event; koyaanisqatsi says the event is already running, and everyone is inside it.
In the work
Scale gone wrong on purpose. Forces too large for the frame, a body dwarfed by what it set in motion.
1 work composed with Koyaanisqatsi
How big, actually.
Drawn to scale against a person of average height. Every size is a 4:5 rectangle, the same proportion as the work itself, so nothing is cropped to fit.
Sizes are the printed image. Framed works add the moulding around that. Standard US shipping is free at every size.
Paper, or canvas.
Same image, same inks. What changes is the surface it is printed on. Tap either one.
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PRINT
Hahnemühle Photo Rag
The paper itself. A heavy 100% cotton matte sheet with a smooth surface, printed edge to edge with no border. Ships flat, or rolled in a tube at large sizes.
- Every size, up to 40 × 50
- You pick the frame
- Just paper and ink
- Needs framing to hang
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CANVAS
Satin poly-cotton, gallery wrap
Printed on canvas, then stretched by hand over solid wood. The image continues around the sides, so there is no border and no glass.
- Hang it the day it lands
- No glass, no glazing
- Real depth off the wall
- Up to 36 × 45
Series 001 numbers are shared across every size and material, and the certificate records exactly which object you own. Open editions carry no number and no certificate.
Framed, or not.
One frame, satin black, solid wood. We pick the moulding that suits the size and the material, so it arrives ready to hang. Tap either one.
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NONE
The work, as it is
A paper print ships flat or rolled and you frame it your way. A canvas needs nothing: it is stretched, wired and ready for the wall the day it lands.
- The lightest to ship
- Your framer, your call
- Canvas hangs as it is
- Every size
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BLACK
Solid wood, chosen for the size
Sealed, hung with hardware fitted, nothing left to arrange. Paper sits behind acrylic; canvas floats inside the moulding with no glass at all.
- STANDARD BLACK ⅞ in face · ¾ in deep · behind acrylic Paper, 8 × 12 and 12 × 18
- ALTO BLACK THIN 1⅜ in face · ⁹⁄₁₆ in deep · behind acrylic Paper, 16 × 24 and up
- BLACK 2 FLOAT ⅜ in face · 2 in deep · ¼ in reveal · no glass Canvas, every framed size
Framed work ships boxed with the hardware fitted. The largest sizes are sold unframed, because a frame that size can only travel by freight.
The list hears first.
Composed with
The rest of the Rare-Liminal family
Where Koyaanisqatsi sits Ky · RARE-LIMINAL FAMILY
OPEN THE TABLERARE-LIMINAL FAMILY75 NAMED · 5 UNDISCOVEREDTAP ANY CELL TO OPEN ITS PAGE
