RUINBORN
Character: Chock-A
Title: Ruinborn, Character: Chock-A
Year: 2022–2026
Format: Experimental short film
Duration: 10 min
Short description
Ruinborn follows Chock-A, a creature born from fragments, ruin, and displaced memory. Through stop motion animation and archival textures, the film explores fragile transformation within a broken world.
Synopsis
Ruinborn is an experimental short film centered on Chock-A, a fragile being assembled from electrical fragments, debris, and displaced memory. Moving through a ruined landscape, the film follows a process of transformation shaped by destruction, accusation, and survival. Combining stop motion animation with filmed material and layered textures, Ruinborn reflects on how broken matter can still carry memory, presence, and the possibility of life.
Visual Moments from Chock-A’s Journey
Process & Development
Early spatial and narrative map, 2024
Mapping the demolished house, the characters’ movements, and the imagined reconstruction of space.
Story and scene development, 2024
Breaking the narrative into actions, transitions, and moments that would later form the stop motion sequence.
Installation Views
Grandi Sogni / A Day in the Life: Young Palestinian Artists in Gaza Now Brera Academy of Fine Arts, Milan, 2026 Curated by Yasmine Aljarba Installation views and photographs by Hiba G. Isleem
Installation views of Chock-A as part of Restless, solo exhibition at Akademie Schloss Solitude, Stuttgart, April 2026.
Installation views and photographs by Hiba G. Isleem
Credits
Directed, animated, filmed, and edited by Hiba G. Isleem
Sound design by Lukas Beyer
Character: Chock A
Background footage filmed in Tulkarm Camp, Palestine, 2024
Developed with support from the Prince Claus Seed Award, 2024, and through the Sawa Sawa Residency at Dar Qandeel for Arts and Culture, Palestine, 2024.
Sound developed during the residency at Akademie Schloss Solitude, Stuttgart, 2026.
Special thanks to Eid Aziz, Mahmoud Abu Hashhash, Husam Abed, Alaa Abu Saa’, and Kifah Fanni.