NADA Miami 2024

The Arrow builds on Romano’s long record of video and filmmaking in which reflexive techniques — wherein the making of the image is present in the final image itself — form both the structure and ethos of the work. Using multiple traditional techniques of animation, including stop-motion and drawn and painted cel animation, the images that comprise The Arrow are shown in various stages of completion. Sometimes, we see a “complete” image, other times, we see the early stages of a drawing outlined only in pencil, the edges of the table in Romano’s studio, or his hands entering the frame to reposition the image. The audio too is reflexive, as we hear the diegetic sounds of the story, an original soundtrack, and the extra-diegetic sounds from Romano’s studio as he lifts the animation table cover and repositions drawings printed on pieces of celluloid overtop watercolour backdrops.

The Arrow is based on the Pfeilstorch, a bird that was found in Germany in 1822 with a 30-inch arrow originating from Africa pierced through its torso. The bird was an important zoological case study in that it demonstrated that birds migrate rather than hibernate or change form during winter. The video’s style of children’s animation creates a cognitive dissonance with the moral of the story, which is one of tragedy and futility, beginning and ending at the hands of hunters who seek to and ultimately succeed in slaying the stork.