session 7.
COVIDeo. AUDIOVISUAL REFLECTIONS DURING TIMES OF MOUTH COVERINGS
Screening + discussion
For this session, we will be presenting video works created by 25 different authors since March, ever since our mouths were explicitly and unapologetically covered by face masks and our rights and freedoms threatened.
The audiovisual reflections include some works of criticism, some that are more aesthetic, humorous, poetic, or philosophical, and others that are very intimate and emotive. Whatever their style, they are all made with finely-tuned feelings and uncovered mouths.
We will be showing works by: Albert Alcoz, Nora Ancarola, Miguel Andrés, Carolina Cabrerizo, Elena Ferrer, Lalo García / Raimon Lorda, Kikol Grau, Javier Guerra, Ramon Guimaraes, Miquel Jordà, Violeta Kokopelli, Francesca Llopis, Elisabet Mabres, Núria Manso, Gonzalo Marcuzzi, Jordi Mitjà, Rrose Present, Diana Rangel, Ana Rodríguez León, Noemi Sjöberg, Jacobo Sucari, Jordi Teixidó, and Ulrich Weitzel.
We will also be screening Fantasmas y virus by Félix Pérez-Hita and other works from Miguel Andrés’ Quarantine Project online, as time restrictions mean they cannot be included during the event.
We are preparing another session to take place during the FLUX December festival at Arts Santa Mònica, where we hope to screen the works received during this call out that we haven’t been able to include on this occasion.
SCREENING:
1
ALBERT ALCOZ
If Not Winter (fragment)
2020_3:23 min
video HD, b/w, music
Directed with JG Guerra. Music by Johannes de Silentio aka Shak Benavides.
During a period of extended lockdown, looking out of a window and observing the neighbourhood can become a ritual of introspection.
http://www.albertalcoz.com/2020/04/if-not-winter.html
2
NORA ANCAROLA
Nosaltres (part I)
2020_4:09 min
(In memory of Aina Roca)
Based on a fragment from Nous en somme by philosopher Hélène Cixous, a situation has been recreated where the will to communicate highlights the difficulties in doing so. The same text read polyphonically allows us to perceive how much semantic distorsion, both visual and textual, can be embedded in a story. The possibility of intervening as spectators in an oral concept that requires a textual translation adds another element to the relational device, as suggested by Cixous. How do we reconstruct ourselves when submerged in the language of the “other”? How can we do this in times of lockdown? Is it even possible?
Text (fragment) Nous en somme, Hélène Cixous
With: Camila Barcellone, Biel Barnils, Mónica Camdepadrós, Horacio Espeche, Paloma G. Díaz, Susana Kamiya, Cloe Masotta, Frederic Montornés, Olga Olivera-Tabeni, Diana Rangel Lampe, Aina Roca, Marion Tamme de Aquista.
www.noraancarola.com
3
MIGUEL ANDRÉS
Experiment #00 (20 días de cuarentena)
2020_0:38 min
Everything is disintegrating. The walls are falling in on us. Projects have been paralised. Everything is left hanging. The world stands still. I grieve. I become demoralised. I want to go on. I want to go out. I want to wake up. I hit my head. My neurons move about. 20 days are a long time to think. It’s time to take up the reins. A new project is born: [Quarantine project].
https://miguelandres.com/quarantineproject/
4
CAROLINA CABRERIZO
Pandemia
2020_2:59 min
During the lockdown, overcome by the situation, I felt the need to create this little hypnotic video, in which I dare to give shape, life, and death to SARS-CoV-2.
5
ELENA FERRER
You see, we don’t love a single season like the flowers
2020_9:59 min
Video / hdv / color
The starting point for this video is a healing circle painted a long time ago by an unknown shaman in an old loft in Brussels. It’s a reflection on our need to reconnect, now more than ever, with our intuitive wisdom and to recover our own capacity to transform in a world where everything is intimately linked. It was made in the spring of 2020, when practically the whole world ground to a halt.
* The title is taken from the Elegies of Duino by Rainer Maria Rilke.
Video financed thanks to Ayudas a la Creación S.O.S ARTE/CULTURA, Fondo de Cultura – VEGAP.
6
LALO GARCÍA & RAIMON LORDA
El confinamiento
2020_4:16 min
The present, night and day. An absurd conversation about life in an even more absurd situation, and all of it taking place during lockdown. Lack of communication within communication. Lack of reality within reality.
http://www.nocredit.es/10-el-confinamiento/
7
KIKOL GRAU
3 minutos para el fin del mundo. Capítulo 4: COVID 19
2020_3 min
A compilation of memes and videos from the first week of lockdown.
8
KIKOL GRAU
3 minutos para el fin del mundo. Capítulo 5: CONSPIRANOIAS
2020_3 min
A compilation of memes and videos from the second week of lockdown.
9
JAVIER GUERRA
Chuletas de cerdo
2020_10:50 min
Lidia, from her armchair, tells us about her immediate surroundings, her memories, her experiences and her visions. At the same time we see a representation of her and her shopping lists.
10
RAMON GUIMARAES
Performetries 04
2020_2:07 min
Created on March 31, 2020 forTRILITA 8, at the request of Francesca Llopis.
Self-absorbed, watching myself reflected in a mirror, I dance with myself for two minutes without looking away. This dance in front of a limited audience at home becomes a clear symbol of the need for love and approval so lacking in humanity.
www.ramonguimaraes.com
11
MIQUEL JORDÀ
Las playas de Barcelona. BCN Lockdown
2020_1:16 min
An observation of the lockdown imposed because of COVID-19 during the permitted outings for sporting activities and exercise at set times on Barcelona beaches, and the institutional slogans of Barcelona’s City Council.
http://www.miqueljorda.com/
12
VIOLETA KOKOPELLI
Casa nostra
2020_01:50 min
Casa nostra aims to introduce us to cycles and the biological world through audiovisuals, poetry, and dance. By linking science and art, it takes us closer to the natural cycles of what is alive.
https://www.violetakokopelli.com/
13
FRANCESCA LLOPIS
!!!!!!!!!!!!
2020_4:24 min
GIF-MP4 1024 × 576
sound: Llapispanc
During lockdown I worked by night,
I felt loneliness at night,
loneliness by day seemed weird,
the shadows, the holes,
the darkness of the night,
were the best place to live.
http://francescallopis.com/
14
ELISABET MABRES
Confined
2020_9 min
A woman experiences the spring 2020 lockdown between her home environment and city escapades. When the circumstances aren’t fully understood, unknown states of awareness emerge.
http://www.elisabetmabres.com
15
ELISABET MABRES
She’s out
2018-2020_3:13 min
She, confined in latex, finally looks to interact with others in Barcelona. Attraction, play, and terror flow with less restriction to protocol than in Hong Kong. The time has come to let go and to take on the freedom of coming out of lockdown, here and now, towards another reality…
http://www.elisabetmabres.com
16
NÚRIA MANSO
Quan tot s’acaba
2020_4:28 min
At this moment, so confusing because of COVID, I ask myself about death. When it all ends, what will there be? What will it represent? How will we feel it?
https://www.nuriamanso.com/
17
GONZALO MARCUZZI IGLESIAS
Doctrinas del shock – antispot antipropaganda
2020_2:05 min
Shock doctrines have been the norm for half a century now (since the 70s in the 20th C). Before that, with terror and blood, or even with the usual puppet dictatorships. Now they’re no longer necessary; democracy has its moments of shock, its millions of dead and its world population obedient and a prey to fear or resignation. This antipropaganda collage wants us to put an end to our own stupidity, cowardice, and incapacity to understand the obvious: we are slaves of neoliberalism/terrorism and of our own democratic miseries.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3U27fix90g0lQ45EO3O_QQ
18
JORDI MITJÀ
Desconfinar un taller
2020_5:05 min
This piece documents my first day back at my workshop after months locked in at home. The impressions of materials, light, and the state of things outside and within the place where I work. The contrast between the state of abandonment and unfettered nature.
www.jordimitja.com
19
RROSE PRESENT
Pandemia: Flores al margen / Malas hierbas
2020_1:33 min
Filmed, edited, produced by: Rrose Present
Music: Oriol Perucho
Les Fonts de Terrassa (Barcelona)
Distributor: The Filmmakers Cooperative
Toni Negri used to say that “Resistance to life” was the only possible Revolution in light of systemic murderous capitalism.
During lockdown, no one cut back the weeds. They grew freely, outside the lines, at the edges of paths. These weeds could represent the demonstrators who enter public space to protest, and at the same time be metaphors from experimental US cinema from the 60s. Filmmakers who opened up paths outside the educating gaze of capital and its methods of communication. Like a revolution of gazes that rescue sensitive items from the capitalist depredation of our existence and allow another way of looking, another way of thinking. They are tools for the battle against colonising looking, colonising thinking. A tribute to Life, to the flowers in the edges that left their fruit under our gaze.
This project was made for the programme: “In Solidarity – Protesto Films in a Time of Crisis” organised by The Filmmakers Cooperative of NYC – COVID 2020. Screening soon: “In Solidarity – Protesto Films in a Time of Crisis” organised by The Filmmakers Cooperative de NYC (online).
http://rroserpresent.eu
20
DIANA RANGEL
Diario 07.04.2020
2020_2:36 min
I’m sharing with you my video diary from April 7, 2020; it was day 24 of lockdown in Barcelona and it was the day we discovered the hidden key to the roof terrace of our building.
Thoughts expressed out loud mingled with memories and processes, tasks to be done, poems on the tip of the tongue, a desire to walk expressed in the path taken by a camera, a landscape that folds and unfolds, like a book, fragile and versatile. A video diary that relates, in few words, my main interests as an artist. This piece considers the worlds that open when one closes oneself up, the words that gestate within us, the overlapping memories that end up defining our present, and the act of narrating out loud to an image/present that slowly observes it all.
www.dianarangel.com
21
ANA RODRÍGUEZ LEÓN
Casa con mujer con casa
2020_4:02 min
A lockdown reflection on stillness and movement.
http://www.anarodriguezleon.com
22
NOEMI SJÖBERG
Fue era coronavirus te odio
2020_9:45 min
colour HD. Filmed in 4K
“It is much easier to act than to think under a tyrannical regime” says Hannah Arendt in her book The Human Condition, which accompanied me during lockdown. From March 13 to April 26, 2020, 42 days, the 6,8 million children under 14 living in Spain were forbidden to go out for any reason that wasn’t absolutely vital. Meanwhile, dogs were allowed out if accompanied by their owners. Urban animals in the cities of Barcelona, Spain and Varanasi, India.
www.noemisjoberg.com
23
JACOBO SUCARI
Muros
2020_3:45 min
Muros is a video about mural paintings and their permanence. About their contemporary transience in a time when messages in public city spaces are forbidden or, at least, made invisible. Created during the lockdown imposed because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Muros talks about real walls that summarise past walls.
https://www.jacobosucari.com/
24
JORDI TEIXIDÓ
Llibre 1
2020_1 min
Hand painted, animated book.
25
JORDI TEIXIDÓ
Llibre 2
2020_1 min
Hand painted, animated book.
26
ULRICH WEITZEL
La publicidad en tiempos de COVID
2020_1:35 min
An advert for a well-known textiles manufacturer was filmed in the magnificent setting of the terrarium at Dr. Schubabh Laboratories, and we obtained exclusive access to the film’s outtakes.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4HnzS9dBb5h5I8QHnh72Rw
27
ULRICH WEITZEL
El martirio de Santa Corona por enfermeros y clérigos humanos
2020_1 min
In the future, coronaviruses have won the war to exterminate humanity and are now the dominant species on planet Earth, which has, at the same time, recovered peace and common sense.
There are many legends about the dark years of the 21st century. The most well-loved are those which make reference to Saint Corona. Born as COVID-19, to unknown parents, she quickly became the charismatic leader of the first attack on humans. She developed many of the tactics of harrassment and wearing down that were decisive throughout the struggle. In the autumn of 2020 she was betrayed, caught, tortured and finally murdered by humans, and was no longer alive for the counter attack mounted by her son, COVID-20, in the autumn of 2020, and for the final victory over the human species with the conquest of Vilanova i la Geltrú in July 2022.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4HnzS9dBb5h5I8QHnh72Rw
ONLINE:
28
MIGUEL ANDRÉS
Quarantine Project
2020_various videos
Performance experiments during the coronavirus lockdown.
https://miguelandres.com/w/quarantineproject/
29
FÉLIX PÉREZ-HITA
Fantasmas y virus
2020_25 min
Script, direction and editing: Félix Pérez-Hita (for “Soy Cámara”, CCCB).
Production: Víctor Diago.
What started out as a eulogy of hands ended up as a reflection on the virus and the global crisis that has revived old ghosts. The non-religious among us experience science with a more magical mindset than we believe. In progressive societies, the notions and fears of guilt and punishment are still with us. It isn’t easy to kill a thousand-year-old God, it isn’t easy to be an atheist. It has been said that football or rock music act as religions, with their idols and mass cults, but science has its own saints, among whom we now remember Louis Pasteur and Robert Koch, who discovered and fought against something invisible to the naked eye, just like spirits. A certain confusion between science, magic, and performance already existed before cinema was invented. We ask ourselves here, without ignoring the unexpected role played by hands, to what extent reality and fiction mix in our experience of a virus that has changed so many things in such a short time.
https://youtu.be/pB6NXfrq9Uw?t=1
FLUX CLUB celebrates its 11th season at the Antic Teatre and the 20th anniversary of its creation in 2000.
This is a fortnightly video programme that reflects the vitality of video creation in Barcelona. It hosts all kinds of sessions with screenings, video performances, and debates offering direct contact between audiences and video creators. The sessions focus on a range of subjects, from monographics of well-known directors to specific themes such as video dance and video poetry, or collective sessions dedicated to emerging authors.
The programme is open to everything currently going on in the field of video in Barcelona, complementing the FLUX Video Auteur Festival with its content and extending its sphere of influence beyond the dates of the festival, which takes place in December.
HABITUAL VIDEO TEAM is a non-profit association that has as its main objective the promotion of activities related to the visual arts, specifically, video art: www.habitualvideoteam.org.
A fundamental area of their work is the organisation of festivals, cycles and video shows, such as the FLUX Video Auteur Festival: www.fluxfestival.org, and the INFLUX Audiovisual Performing Arts Festival: www.influxfestival.org.
Another area of Habitual Video Team’s activity is video documentation of cultural events mainly related to experimental music and poetry performances. In 2012 they launched the SUMMA project in order to convert this audiovisual heritage (more than 1000 recordings) into a non-profit online video archive: www.summa-hvt.org.