Hybrid Compositions. Mercury & Rh- Blood (2024/2025)

The 3D animation “Mercury & RH-Blood” represents a transhumanist journey into the identity of humans as biological-technological hybrids, rooted in a dynamic fusion of mythological origins and contemporary Anthropocene challenges. As an expression of postmedial aesthetics, the project explores heterogeneity as an aesthetic, narrative, and ontological principle, manifested in a multimedia dialogue between pulsating animations and upcycled material objects. Blood, symbolizing biological vitality, emergent consciousness, and species memory, contrasts with mercury — including the mythical “red mercury” — which embodies technological transformations, alchemical ambivalence, toxicity, and the elusive illusion of digital immortality, weaving a tautological network of meanings.

In its artistic vision, the animation depicts dynamic interactions between organic blood veins and synthetic mercury tubes, reflecting the tension between human essence and its technological reinterpretation. Blood, present in fluid, pulsating forms, evokes life, regeneration, and deeply rooted biological identity, while mercury — especially the “red mercury”, a mythical material shrouded in mystery and speculation about supernatural properties — symbolizes not only the alienation of transhumanist fantasies but also alchemical transformation and Jungian aspects of the unconscious, such as the shadow and the process of individuation. Its alleged invisibility in mirrors, highlighted by the reflective surfaces of glass and metal, reinforces the autoreferentiality of technology, which mimics life yet remains ephemeral and incomplete.

Drawing from complex systems theory, the project suggests that the heterogeneity of these elements — blood and mercury, biological and synthetic, organic and digital — generates emergent narratives surpassing the sum of their parts. Within the context of upcycled objects combining diverse materials like glass, resin, silicone, and metal, the animation becomes a metaphor for negotiating identity in an era of technological transformation, where waste regeneration offers an ethical response to Anthropocene chaos. “Mercury & RH- Blood” does not present a linear narrative but a fragmentary, discontinuous space of meanings, where blood and “red mercury” coexist in a dialogue on hybridity, affirming the possibility of harmony between the human and the non-human in a rapidly changing world — a vision that takes on particular power in the face of times when technology and ecology become increasingly inseparable.

Technical and Realization Aspects of the Animation

The animation “Mercury & RH- Blood” was realized as a complex system of animated object-render modules, employing a creative approach to artificial intelligence (AI) in the design and rendering process. The creative workflow integrates Blender 3D software with AI plugins and animation applications. Midjourney was used to generate synthetic structures and organic objects from prompts, such as pulsating blood veins and fluid mercury tubes. Individual objects underwent further modification using Adobe Photoshop and Recraft. For animating the resulting forms, I interchangeably utilized Meshy, RunwayML, Pika, and Hedra. The animation modules were designed as independent segments — each representing a distinct narrative aspect, such as the modulation of blood as dynamic biological tissue or the transformation of mercury into lustrous forms — later synchronized into a cohesive whole. Sound design incorporated my own recordings (as a musician) alongside effects generated with Eleven Labs.

The entire project was synchronized with visuals and finalized in DaVinci Resolve. AI played a crucial role in experimentally shaping textures and materials, enabling the creation of discontinuous, emergent visual effects, such as variable glows and fluid transitions between solid and liquid states, facilitating dynamic module interactions leading to a final MP4 compilation. The process, spanning March to July 2025, blended manual modeling with autonomous AI iterations, creating a hybrid work that mirrors the project’s core — negotiating between human creativity and machine intelligence.