A short documentary about tattoo artist Herman Devyashin, who is trying to find a way out of a creative crisis.

He calls this crisis a «circle» and associates it with his creative burnout, which increases during the endless repetition of the process

To get out of the circle, he decides to make a tattoo in a way that no one has ever done before, wearing augmented reality goggles.

Director’s Vision for ‘The Circle’

This project was formed as a full-fledged story only after the shooting.

When Herman decided to tattoo in augmented reality glasses, it became clear that it was important not to miss the moment. I was sure that the approach of video art or experiment would not work here. We need a full—fledged short film that would tell not so much about the process as about the person and his path to such a complex performance.

When the process was filmed and the film went to be developed, the main part of the work began. It was important to put together all the facts, causes and consequences that accompanied this project.

We spent more than one evening with Herman talking and discussing his states “before” the experiment and feelings “after”.

The story finally formulated itself in the late stages of post-production (when the installation was ready). Therefore, the final version of the story (with ready-made formulations and pauses) was superimposed on the story literally “groove into groove”.