Draw me into your Vastness
Virginia Woods-Jack

Draw me into your Vastness explores the cycles we exist within and alongside. Woods-Jack’s film is a meditation on the ocean as an archive of memory. Shot on Super8 and developed in wakame seaweed harvested from the Te Whanganui-a-Tara coastline, the film itself is infused with the very stuff of the sea. Wakame is an introduced and invasive species in Aotearoa (New Zealand). It’s fast-growing, prolific, and disruptive to native kelp forests. Yet, as seaweed, it also belongs to the “blue carbon” ecosystems vital for absorbing carbon and producing oxygen. This paradox makes its presence here especially resonant – a plant that embodies resilience also brings ecological vulnerability.

The work began with a full-moon swim in the summer of 2024, when the artist found a handwritten note in the sand – an anonymous young woman’s aspirations and desires. Woods-Jack chose to return the words to the sea.