A series of time-lapse clips taken from high vantage points showing the lights of traffic zipping through the monolithic buildings in Tokyo.
Set to a slow and moody piece of piano music with some electronic sound effects.
Aerial Arterial presents Tokyo from above. Its sprawling nocturnal cityscapes crisscrossed by thruways. It begins with shots atop the world’s tallest tower—the Tokyo Skytree—with the expanses of the urban grid illuminated by headlights below. We end closer to the concrete with dizzying loops traced by traffic.
In between these poles, the massive fiery-hued highways pulse through the wards of Minato and Shinjuku, like veins circulating blood. The towering skyscrapers watch over all, unmoved—soaring sentinels of steel and glass. Not a soul is seen. Only machines.
The music is minimal. The images need space to breath. Tender Japanese flavored chords are accompanied by street beeps, night noises and satellite hums. After all, in the metropolis, the crickets are replaced by singing machinery.
This is an ode to edifices of the great eastern capital. To its atmosphere and infrastructure. A static lullaby for a city on stilts.
