Film and Video Umbrella are thrilled to be partnering with Arnolfini throughout Spring and Summer 2026 to present FVU New Takes. Starting with Hantao Li’s work Giants’ Anatomy (2026) from the 28 February, each month FVU New Takes will showcase a newly commissioned work in Arnolfini’s Dark Studio on Level 2.
About the work
The oil industry is one of the primary contributors to carbon emissions, directly accelerating global warming and causing sea levels to rise. Meanwhile, the offshore oil rig industry has been in steep decline since 2014. From over 5,500 platforms in operation in 1981, the number had dropped to fewer than 2,000 by 2023.
Cromarty Firth, known as Scotland’s 'oil rig graveyard', hosts numerous decommissioned rigs, their future use uncertain. Many of these platforms are sent to ship-breaking yards thousands of miles away, where the environmental impact of these actions can be conveniently forgotten about, while others sit idle, awaiting reactivation.
Giants' Anatomy envisions a speculative journey for decommissioned North Sea oil platforms through this liminal landscape, combining real world footage with CGI to explore their potential afterlife, and question when the infrastructure loses its function, does it still hold meaning? Or only mass?
At times as absurd as it is strikingly plausible, the film plays with notions of truth and reality while asking us to consider all possible futures.
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Giants' Anatomy (2026) has been commissioned as part of FVU New Takes, an FVU initiative supported by Jerwood Foundation. FVU is supported using public funding by Arts Council England.