POWER/LAND opens with a series of questions posed in German, forcing English speakers to imagine what the words and images implicate; to interpret the sounds as an atmosphere, rather than a concrete reality. New York-via-Munich band Haerts and San Diego based visual artist Julian Klincewicz have joined forces to create an abstract short film/ music film, providing visuals for three unreleased Haerts songs.

“The idea is to both put on display and be immersed in the inherently valuable and beautiful ways people interact with their surrounding spaces and people near, to create a sense of foreign familiarity.” Julian Klincewicz says.

Nini Fabi from Haerts says: “We had these three songs that we always imagined in a more cinematic context. We wanted to collaborate with a visual artist and I found Julian on the internet. I was instantly drawn to his rhythm and the way he showed a strange beauty in the very normal, the things we often overlook. The people he filmed reacted to him, almost as if he was in love with them, or they with him. There was a natural lightness, but at the same time a sincere focus in his work, that resonated with Benny and me”.

Klincewicz’s video “can be” described as movements, juxtapositions of motion and color, emphasized through piercing facial close-ups. The ethereal quality of Haerts’ music has found its visual match in the work of Klincewicz, whose work has previously been featured on Dazed. The video grabs the viewer from the beginning, whether or not he/she understands questions being asked.

The choice to include speech in German was deliberate,says Klincewicz:

“I want people to feel immediately that they are entering a different space. I thought posing this series of questions in another language, questions for this projection of what some kind of love might look like, Alma, would create this environment and mood, in a much stronger way than if we as English speakers knew exactly what we are asking. It’s open to be projected on”.

Julian adds: “Power comes from a conversation we all had while in Indiana, about what personal freedom/power looks like – What makes us as people feel the opposite of weak, the opposite of crushed, what makes us clear. I wanted to use LAND since I think the locations for me were so relevant – that sense of real space that is for me, very unique to the mid west… I also like the way they play together as individual words or as a fictional place.”

POWER/LAND features three unreleased songs by Haerts, The soundtrack to the film is available on Spotify and iTunes now. The video, including trailers and a series of Super8 stills can be viewed below.