(JERSEY CITY, NJ) -- "Within Reach" is an cinematic interactive art installation about transformation, reconnecting with the origin, nature and our relationship to it, created by filmmaker Laia Cabrera and visual artist Isabelle Duverger in collaboration with interactive designer Aniol Saurina Masó and composer Nana Simopoulos. It is visible as a video installation, now through September 30, from outside between the hours of 12 noon to 5:00am at Art Wall Coolvines Powerhouse in Jersey City.  People may interact with the installation from noon to 10:00pm.

Conceived as a seamless projection mapping design with gesture responsive interactivity, "Within Reach" invites the audience to actively enter the heart of the piece creating a story that unfolds across a series of immersive interactive scenarios. The installation is a sensory experience thought the elements, from the earth to the skies, from liquid shapes to seeds and visual metaphors, and the principle of change and transformation, where the line is blurred between the physical and the digital world, between the real and the imaginary.

Thanks to this new interactive projection art installation, Within Reach, you can become a shapeshifting digital self inside the Art Wall at Coolvines Powerhouse. Only, instead of your image, it reveals an ephemeral body of swirling bubbles, shape of leaves, grains of barley and coffee, and moving particles.

"We are far, minuscule, looking from above, but we are actors, actively morphing and shaping what we see," explained Cabrera and Duverger. "The sea is moving the trees, from the molecules to the exploration of nature and its fruits. 'Within Reach' explores the soul of nature, it’s quietness and its power, fertility trough avatars being the fruits and seeds to the infinitesimal and the microscopic on a journey of landscapes and its enchanting beauty. The human presence is only visible at the beginning at gen end as a minuscule glimpse of looking at the skies, where coffee grains and bubbles are rain on our dreams.

"Once you enter the installation space, a digital reflection of yourself appears in diferent shapes, textures and forms, and will follow your every move, transforming the projections-visuals as well," they continued. "Place yourself in front and start waving or moving to see your mirrored image-avatar on the wall. The audience can affect change, create an avatar of themselves and discover ways to interact with the installation, embody the different storylines and share the experience with each other." 

You can experience the installation and transform it without having to touch anything, and you can interact freely while following the social distancing guidelines. One of their goals was to make the video installation visible from outside, so at night fall and all night, it is visible from the street and during the day until 10:00pm, while still being visible from outside, people can come inside and interact with it. 

Art Wall Coolvines Powerhouse is located at 350 Warren Street in Jersey City, New Jersey.

Artist Bios:
Laia Cabrera is a filmmaker and video artist based in New York and critically recognized director and multimedia creator, working in the fields of new cinema, projection mapping design, video art, visual poetry, documentary and immersive interactive art installations, with many projects straddling or blending elements of both fields. Ms. Cabrera is recognized for innovative interdisciplinary work which merges cinematic and digital arts, dance, music, theater and visual arts with pieces performed at leading venues, inaugurating arts festivals, installed in museums and presented worldwide and commissioned by major institutions. Recipient of many awards including Silver Telly Award for best Direction, AVA and Telly awards for best Animation, Documentary and Art Direction; NYIT awards 2015 winner for Best Art Production and 3-time nominee for Outstanding Innovative Video Design and winner of the Kodak & Color Lab award for Best Cinematic film for Under Influence. She is also the recipient of the several grants, KrTU Creators, Cultura i de les Arts (CONCA), NYC Council on the Arts, and DC Commission for the Arts and Humanities among others. She is the co-founder and artistic director of LAIA CABRERA & CO with multimedia artist Isabelle Duverger, a team of visual artists creating a wide range of interdisciplinary projects.

Isabelle Duverger is an award-winning Jersey City based French multimedia artist. Her work includes public art with projection mapping on buildings, immersive interactive video and sound installations, projection art for theater and dance, video-art and animation. She is a three-time New York Innovative Theater Awards nominee for Outstanding Innovative Design. With her long-time collaborator Laia Cabrera, she helped create Coolture Impact interactive public art platform in Times Square, which they inaugurated with their piece "The Now". Her work has been presented in renowned venues such as Spring/Break Art Show (Armory Arts Week), Central Park Summer Stages, Times Square Plaza and St John the Divine Cathedral, La Mama, Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) in New York, NJPAC, Flutter Experience Art Gallery, Los Angeles, Nuit Blanche and Georgetown Glow, Washington DC, Teatros del Canal, Madrid, Spain and Tempietto Di Bramante, Roma, Italy among others.

PHOTO BY Isabelle Duverger