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Posted On: June 23rd 2023, 07:57 pm
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Maybe today - with yesterdays thunder storm and this weekend being the last days to see “Nothing to see” at @kunsttempel_kassel, where this film is showing - is a good chance to recap some thoughts on this older work of mine and also thank everyone who was involved in it. (Thank you again!)
To sum it up, this film - a mockumentary without any real plot - poses more questions than answers. Questions about film making, questions on coloniality and the rain forest.
Maybe a good way to understand the film is to talk about Henri Rousseau (who apparently never went to the tropics - though is mostly known for painting tropical rain forests) and one of his paintings “Surpris!” from 1891 which appears as a prop in [Gewitterzustand].
The painting shows a tiger that is caught up in a thunderstorm, and from the look of it, looks afraid - afraid of thunder - afraid of dying.
In the film we see an upper class society who is celebrating their ascension to immortality in a villa. The painting is hanging in the main dancing room, behind the two musicians - a piano player and a singer - that for that night have the less-fun task entertain the slightly drunk guests with music.
The villa has a large tropical greenhouse, where the guests can retreat from the party into its fictitious and secluded landscapes.
Almost like in the paintings by Rousseau, this tropical rainforest looks a bit too surreal due to the artificiality of it's mise-en-scène.
But, unlike in Rousseaus scenery with the tiger, the tropical rainforest in the villa is contained and is save from all fundamental forces of nature.
By the end of the film we see the (not so) dramatic climax - [spoiler alert] - an unspectacular light and sound show simulating a thunder storm over the jungle.
Maybe this simulation is a reflection on film itself?
Or maybe this society plays it, so they feel - at least something - in this (way too perfect) world they created?
The musicians play their last song: A sea man's song of distant lands. A romanticized ode to the far. The guests are falling in deep slumber.
[Gewitterzustand], 20 min., 2016
To sum it up, this film - a mockumentary without any real plot - poses more questions than answers. Questions about film making, questions on coloniality and the rain forest.
Maybe a good way to understand the film is to talk about Henri Rousseau (who apparently never went to the tropics - though is mostly known for painting tropical rain forests) and one of his paintings “Surpris!” from 1891 which appears as a prop in [Gewitterzustand].
The painting shows a tiger that is caught up in a thunderstorm, and from the look of it, looks afraid - afraid of thunder - afraid of dying.
In the film we see an upper class society who is celebrating their ascension to immortality in a villa. The painting is hanging in the main dancing room, behind the two musicians - a piano player and a singer - that for that night have the less-fun task entertain the slightly drunk guests with music.
The villa has a large tropical greenhouse, where the guests can retreat from the party into its fictitious and secluded landscapes.
Almost like in the paintings by Rousseau, this tropical rainforest looks a bit too surreal due to the artificiality of it's mise-en-scène.
But, unlike in Rousseaus scenery with the tiger, the tropical rainforest in the villa is contained and is save from all fundamental forces of nature.
By the end of the film we see the (not so) dramatic climax - [spoiler alert] - an unspectacular light and sound show simulating a thunder storm over the jungle.
Maybe this simulation is a reflection on film itself?
Or maybe this society plays it, so they feel - at least something - in this (way too perfect) world they created?
The musicians play their last song: A sea man's song of distant lands. A romanticized ode to the far. The guests are falling in deep slumber.
[Gewitterzustand], 20 min., 2016
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