Quantum phenomena and Indonesian textile design
Karen Barad’s writing on entanglement offers a starting point for this film: matter is never isolated but always formed through relations, histories, and encounters. This premise shapes Moirai, Thread of Life, where observational practice and narrative structure are used to consider how the world might appear if quantum processes were the underlying logic of experience.
The film asks a direct question: What if quantum mechanisms governed the ordinary? Concepts such as entanglement, superposition, and wave–particle duality are not illustrated as scientific diagrams but translated into a visual system drawn from Southeast Asian textile traditions—particularly ceremonial fabrics from Sumatra and the broader Maritime Silk Road. Their symbolic geometry, patterning, and woven logic become a way to think about invisible or counterintuitive physical processes.
In weaving, the interaction of warp and weft generates patterns from simple binary choices. This structure parallels quantum systems that occupy multiple states at once until interaction forces a resolution. The dual perspectives of fabric—front, back, pattern, structure—echo wave–particle duality. The film leverages this analogy to depict how form emerges from uncertainty, how information moves through time, and how parallel possibilities coexist before collapsing into a single observable outcome.
Moirai extends this textile-quantum metaphor into a multidimensional framework—a speculative “tesseract of fabrics” where each layer carries encoded histories of time, space, and relation. This aligns with many-worlds thinking, in which all outcomes unfold across parallel branches rather than a single line of fate.
The title references the Moirai of Greek mythology, figures who measure and cut the thread of each life. In this interpretation, the Moirai are not arbiters of fixed destiny but agents that entangle individuals with multiple potential paths, each of which exists simultaneously until resolved through lived experience.
The project emerged through sustained dialogue across disciplines. Science advisor Professor Rainer Helmut Dumke provided guidance on the underlying physics. The animation was produced with CraveFX, building on earlier collaborations. Tate Egon Chavez composed and produced the sound. Research on Southeast Asian textiles informed the visual vocabulary, reconnecting Conradi with her background in weaving and material craft. Early previsualization experiments used AI to test compositional ideas, contributing to the conceptual phase without appearing in the final film.
After an eighteen-month production period, the film was completed in December 2022. A work-in-progress version screened at LA ACM SIGGRAPH, initiating its festival trajectory.
Moirai, Thread of Life positions textile knowledge, quantum theory, and contemporary animation as coexistent systems—each capable of describing how the world coheres, divides, and recombines.
BEST IN SHOW: SA Computer Animation Festival ’23: ACM SIGGRAPH Asia 2023 Computer Animation Festival Sydney, NSW, Australia. https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3626964.3626975
MOIRAI, THREAD OF LIFE named SILVER COLLISION WINNER for THE BEST EXPERIENTIAL – ART & CULTURE in the inaugural Collision Awards Honoring Excellence in Animation and Motion Design
SINGAPORE — 16 JULY 2024 – MOIRAI, THREAD OF LIFE announced today that it has been named an Experiential -Art & Culture winner for the Inaugural Collision Awards. Inaugural winners include BUCK, Crunchroll, Golden Wolf, Hornet, Netflix, Nickelodeon, Paramount Pictures, Partizan, Sony Pictures Animation, The Daily Show, Pixar, and Walt Disney Studios. This is an incredible achievement. Collision Awards received exceptional entries from more than 30 countries, and the winners represent the most innovative stories being told globally.
The Collision Awards Jury selects Collision Award Winners, an international panel of experts across animation and motion design.
Members include Sarah Cox (Executive Creative Director/Aardman), Marge Dean (Head of Skybound Animation Studio and President/Women in Animation), Ronnie del Carmen (Co-director & writer of Pixar’s Inside Out), Maureen Fan (Chief Executive Officer/Baobab Studios), Jinko Gotoh (Producer Finding Nemo), Jay Grandin (Co-Founder and Executive Creative Director/Giant Ant), Julie Lockhart (Co-Founder and President of Production/Locksmith Animation), Andrew Millstein (Co-Head/Annapurna Animation), Mike Moloney (Founder and Executive Creative Director/Art&Graft) Gilles Monteil (Animation Expert/Ubisoft) and Ramsey Naito (President/ramount Animation and President/Nickelodeon Animation) amongst others.
The full list of the 1st Annual Collision Awards winners can be found at collisionawards.com/winners
“I’m truly impressed with the caliber, quality and variety of work and entrants in our inaugural season. We set out to cement the concept of animation as a medium across a breadth of media and disciplines, and I feel like we’re on our way to achieving it,” says Randeep Katari, Collision Awards General Manager, “from the biggest films in the world to localized campaigns, our winners exemplify that animation is truly a global medium, and I’m excited to see what the future of animation brings.”
“Now more than ever, we are thrilled to recognize the unsung heroes whose time in the spotlight is long overdue.” Collison Awards
About the Collision Awards: The Collision Awards is the first global and holistic platform solely dedicated to honoring excellence in Animation and Motion Design in all its forms. Launching in partnership with various industry leaders, our mission is to establish a holistic platform that celebrates the unique and incomparable creativity and technical talent in Animation and Motion Design across Marketing & Communications, Commercials, Television, Film, Experiential, Games & XR. We recognize how an entire industry and community can benefit when the best work and talent is credibly recognized by its community and beyond. Follow @collisionawards for more details.
About MOIRAI, THREAD OF LIFE
A film by Ina Conradi and Mark Chavez
Animation production by CRAVEFX
The original score and sound design by Tate Egon Chavez
Supported by the Ministry of Education Singapore’s Academic Research Fund.
This awe-inspiring journey through cosmic dimensions delves into quantum physics, symbolically representing the interconnected threads of quantum phenomena shaping the destinies of all beings.
Moirai, Thread of Life Web Site https://moirai.mediaartnexus.com/
Media Art Nexus Web Site https://www.mediaartnexus.com/
Winner Details
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