MARKUS WINTERSBERGER · 1994 / 1998 / 2026 · VERSION C
Naht
PATHFINDER ⇄ THE BODYBOX
The body as archive
Where do you cut a body open to lay it flat? In 1994 the seam ran along the back of the head – the face stayed intact in the centre of the unwrapping. In 2026 it runs straight through the face.
Version C is the third and sharpest re-translation. After measurement (A) and wayfinding (B), the body is read as what remains of it: an archive of photographs, animations, containers, files and checksums. Every unwrapping needs a seam – and every seam is a decision about what is torn and what is saved.
Keyword archive
PATHBODY · 1991–2026 · MOBILE VIA QR17,111artefacts · 1991–2026
Every trace of PATHFINDER and THE BODYBOX in one place: photographs, scans, montages, films, websites, 3D models with AR view and the source code of the five 2026 versions – each artefact with archive ID, checksum, keywords and locations. Search, timeline and full screen.
AV 2026
4K · 16:9 · MP4Translation
1994 / 1998 → 2026| 1994 / 1998 | 2026 · VERSION C | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Seam | cut at the back of the head – the face stays in the centre (1994) | → | cut through the face – the halves move to the edges |
| Skin | unwrapped body surface as landscape | → | texture atlas · UV unwrapping · Tissot indicatrix |
| Container | industrial container with body skin on the motorway (1998) | → | file container: ISO-BMFF boxes · JPEG blocks · checksum |
| Path | flight path of the animation »pathfinder« | → | slit-scan: the path as time-image · route as a lying seam |
| Archive | body photographed in segments and assembled | → | keyword archive: 16,058 artefacts, 18,984 occurrences, PBX IDs, SHA-256 |
| Self | “an ‘other’, yet a ‘familiar strangeness’” | → | doppelgänger at the seam · difference image |A − B| |
The seam. Every 3D model that carries a texture has been cut open somewhere. The UV seam decides where the skin tears when it is laid flat. In 1994 PATHFINDER placed this seam at the back of the head, so the face lies in the centre of the landscape. The series “Der Körper als Archiv” (2026) paints it right onto the face – Version C takes this gesture literally.
The archive. In 1991 the body was photographed in segments, assembled in 1994, driven to Linz on a container in 1998, and scattered ever since as web pages, animations and videos. In 2026 everything is counted: 16,058 artefacts in 18,984 locations – down to the last single frame of the PATHFINDER series –, each with an archive ID (PBX) and a checksum. The archive is itself an unwrapping – the attempt to bring a body completely onto a surface.
Zeitgeist. Today the body is first a data set: face recognition, avatars, texture atlases, compression. Version C shows these methods not as effects but as a cut: what happens to a face when it is mirrored at the seam, subtracted from itself, read through a slit, broken into 8 × 8 blocks?
Visual language. Paper, ink and a single accent: chroma blue, the colour of keying and of the cutting mark. Every caption is an archive label, every chapter change a cut that tears the image open. The header of this page counts the 16,058 archive IDs as you read.
Chapters
LONG 5:36 · TRAILER 3:44
00Opening
LONG 0:00 · TRAILER 0:00The 1991 striped light runs across the face; a seam is stitched and separates the title from the body: “Naht · The Body as Archive”.
01I · Archive
LONG 0:20 · TRAILER 0:14The entire holdings as one wall: 16,058 artefacts from 1991 to 2026, each with archive ID and checksum – photographs, montages, videos, single frames of the PATHFINDER series, web pages, documents. A search moves through the keywords – full-body scan, container, motorway, seam, single frame, PATHFINDER IV, BASEMENT, doppelgänger, other – a loupe reads every hit until the portrait with the seam fills the frame.
02II · Seam
LONG 1:08 · TRAILER 0:45The cut line is drawn: the 2026 portrait opens along the seam painted on the face, and in the gap lies the 1994 unwrapping – whose seam ran along the back of the head. Tissot ellipses measure what laying flat costs.
03III · Twin
LONG 2:00 · TRAILER 1:16Mirrored at the seam, two other faces appear: left + left, right + right. Image pairs from the series are subtracted from each other – what remains is the difference image |A − B|.
04IV · Trace
LONG 2:52 · TRAILER 1:47The 1998 animation »pathfinder« read through a single slit: time becomes space, every column another moment. The route Vienna → Krems → Linz lies as a seam across the photographs of the journey.
05V · Compression
LONG 3:48 · TRAILER 2:18“The pixels of the container are accelerated to 100 km/h” (1998) – today the codec accelerates. JPEG blocks crumble, the box structure of the video file shows itself as a container within the container.
06VI · Other
LONG 4:40 · TRAILER 2:49The yellow glove, the brush, the animal skull: the 2026 series paints the seam onto the face. The 1996 quotation closes the seam – “an ‘other’, yet a ‘familiar strangeness’”.
07Credits
LONG 5:14 · TRAILER 3:20Credits, foundation, cycle, methods and references, links – along an open seam at the left edge.
Twin
DER KÖRPER ALS ARCHIV · 2026The seam instrument above mirrors the portrait at the painted seam – drag the seam and another face appears. Below, the image pairs from the series from which the film computes its difference images.
Gores
THEOREMA EGREGIUM · 1827- GORES
- 4
- LENGTH DISTORTION AT 80°
- –
- TOTAL SEAM LENGTH
- –
The head is not a developable surface. Gauss proved in 1827 that no curved surface can be laid flat without distorting lengths (Theorema egregium). Globe makers therefore cut the sphere into gores: the more seams, the less distortion – and the more seam. Below 5 % the reading turns blue.
Image: PATHFINDER 1994, head unwrapping in gold (cut at the back of the head, face in the centre).
Archive
PBX-000001 FF. · SHA-256The keyword archive PATHBODY orders 16,058 artefacts in 18,984 locations from 1991 to 2026: striped-light photographs, montages, container and transport images, animations, videos, the PATHFINDER series I–V with sources and 13,500 single frames, the related machines BIO FIKTION and Meta Fiktion, 3D scenes, games, web pages and documents. Every format appears in its own way – image, filmstrip, waveform, 3D viewer, PDF page, text. Data as JSON, JSON-LD, CSV, Excel and SQLite; as a web page and as a desktop app for macOS and Windows.
3D · Experience · Game
PAGES
Methods
PYTHON · NUMBA · THREE.JS · SQLITE- Archive
- Recursive scan of all project folders; SHA-256 per file (above 64 MiB: partial checksum), ffprobe metadata, thumbnails (WebP), keywords from paths, file names and visual inspection; JSON, CSV and SQLite with FTS5 full text.
- Seam
- Cut line from visual inspection of the portrait (x = 713 + 0.009 · y), opening by perspective transform per half; Tissot indicatrix of the head unwrapping.
- Twin
- Mirroring at the seam; difference image |A − B| from registered image pairs of the 2026 series.
- Trace
- Slit-scan of the animation »pathfinder« (1998): one column per frame, time becomes space.
- Compression
- JPEG re-encoding at falling quality (OpenCV), box tree of the MP4 file (ISO-BMFF) as diagram.
- Rendering
- Own image engine (Python · NumPy · Numba · OpenCV), 3840 × 2160 · 25 fps, H.264 High 5.1; sound synthesised numerically (needle stitches, paper, tape noise), −16 LUFS.
- Web
- three.js · WebXR immersive-ar with hit test, otherwise camera window · glTF 2.0 with morph targets · desktop apps with Electron (macOS Apple Silicon/Intel, Windows x64).
Cycle
1991 → 2026Version C builds on A and B and is woven into them: the same archives, the same route (200.8 km), the same container (720 × 265 × 250 cm) – now read as a seam. The keyword archive connects all three versions with the works of 1991–1998.
References
WORKS · METHODS · LITERATURE- PATHFINDER. Digitale Bildmontage 1994Photography · animation · video · full-body scan in striped light 1991 · medienwerkstatt006.at/pathf.htm
- THE BODYBOX. Skulptur in Bewegung 1998Truck · container · animation · video · performance · O.K Centre for Contemporary Art Linz, “Natürlich Künstlich” 1998
- ENTFLACHUNG · Version A 2026Measuring light – the 1991 scan read as striped-light measurement
- WEGFINDUNG · Version B 2026The body as terrain – the route as self-portrait · game WEGFINDER
- Der Körper als ArchivSeries 2026 · self-portraits with painted seam, glove, brush, animal skull · basis of chapters II, III and VI
- C. F. GaußDisquisitiones generales circa superficies curvas · Göttingen 1827 (Theorema egregium)
- N. A. TissotMémoire sur la représentation des surfaces et les projections des cartes géographiques · Paris 1881
- StandardsJPEG ISO/IEC 10918-1 · ISO Base Media File Format ISO/IEC 14496-12 · SHA-256 FIPS 180-4 · Z. Wang et al., Image Quality Assessment (SSIM), IEEE TIP 13 (4), 2004
- Vilém FlusserDigitaler Schein · in: F. Rötzer (Hg.), Digitaler Schein, Frankfurt/Main 1991
- ProductionConcept · image · sound · code: Markus Wintersberger · medienwerkstatt006 · Vienna 2026 – in dialogue with Claude (Anthropic) · no generative image AI: all images from the 1991–1998 archive and the 2026 series