Faster Than Light is the poetic tale of a queer woman abruptly transported through multiple dimension to uncover knowledge of a forgotten ancien technology essential to bringing peace to her community’s ongoing struggle.

Faster Than Light is an intermedia project (including films and performances) situated on the intersections of technology, identity, consciousness, trauma, and survival. Through movement research, collaborative media making and visionary fiction, Kumanomido, Owen & friends have developed a work for multimedia broadcasts throughout the city of Athens and across Europe.

During their 2 months residency at Onassis Cultural Centre as a part of the EMAP / EMARE program, the artists researched non-digital networks within the urban ecology of Athens, choosing to work closely with the LGBTQIA+ community of Athens. After the EMAP research residency, Kumanomido, Owen & their Athens-based cast continued to collaborate and further develop Faster Than Light into a short film and hybrid performance project.

Following the brutal murder of one of their cast members on September 21st, 2018 and the resulting mass media misinformations, Faster Than Light became a complex visual song of the Athenian LGBTQIA+ community as they find healing from this loss and the ongoing hate based violence placed upon genderqueer, trans and female bodies. Faster Than Light is a visual journey dedicated to those queer beings violently robbed of their life and the communities that survive to continue the resistance to these injustices.

Credits:
Co-directed: Kentaro Kumanomido & Thomas Anthony Owen
Film participants: ActiVista / George Kounanis, Chraja, Tracy Fischer, Giorgos Kalogeropoulos, Efi Karagiannopoulou, Zak Kostopoulos, Maria Michailidou, Thomas Anthony Owen, Khalid Prem, Evi Tsaklanou, Avraam Vrohidis
Vouge Performance: Chraja
Lead Sound Design: Stratos Bichakis
Music
Where Did I Go?: BLANKIE / Alicia Grant
Αρχιπουστης : Chraja
Cinematography: Nikolas Pottakis, Kentaro Kumanomido, Thomas Anthony Owen (lead camera), Zinzi Buchanan (support camera)
Makeup support: Anastasia Athanasiou
Translation support: Anis Alexandros El Namparaoui
Special thanks to: Mor Demer and Vicki Kapo
Produced by: Onassis Cultural Centre-Athens