Wendelien van Oldenborgh, Pertinho de Alphaville, 2010, Film still, Courtesy of the artist

Veronika Eberhart, 9 is 1 and 10 is none, 2017, Film still, Courtesy of the artist

Giorgi Gago Gagoshidze, The Invisible Hand of My Father, 2018, Film still, Courtesy of the artist

Monika Uchiyama, a new use, 2018, Film still, Courtesy of the artist

Film programme “a new use”

May 2022
Part of the public programme for Kristina Benjocki’s solo exhibition at IKOB
An online film screening about political histories, labour and resistance, featuring short films by Veronika Eberhart, Giorgi Gago Gagoshidze, Wendelien van Oldenborgh and Monika Uchiyama. This event formed part of the public programme for the exhibition "Kristina Benjocki: At sunset we retreat once again, up the hill, to where we can watch the skeins of water reflect colours we’ve never seen before" at IKOB.

Focusing on textile production as a vehicle for re-examining dominant historical narratives, Kristina Benjocki's exhibition is a poetic interrogation of how textiles and the very practice of weaving intersect with technological progress, national histories, and the construction of cultural identity. The selection of films places a particular focus on the arising themes of labour and industry and the relationship between human bodies and machines. The works reflect on the changing nature of labour structures, suggesting that the transition to a capitalist, post-industrial economy is an ongoing struggle that continues to demand and provoke political resistance.

The screening included a short introduction to Kristina Benjocki's exhibition and was followed by a Q&A with the artists Kristina Benjocki, Veronika Eberhart, Wendelien van Oldenborgh and Monika Uchiyama.

FILM PROGRAMME:

Veronika Eberhart, 9 is 1 and 10 is none, 2017, Video, 22min
The resurrection of a closed-down wood workshop through performative interventions: In pantomime, dance-like choreographies, machines are put back in operation. Working processes are reproduced in their specific rhythms of movement. A mythical invocation of the past and an artistic reflection on femaleness in a capitalist society.

Monika Uchiyama, a new use, 2018, single-channel video, 24min
An observational documentary about a Tokyo family business that has made wax products for generations. Amidst the light banter and pleasant routines of a day’s work lie growing concerns about the family’s future.

Giorgi Gago Gagoshidze, The Invisible Hand of My Father, Video, 2018, 24min
The film tells the story of the artist's father, a former car-factory manager in the Soviet Union turned migrant construction worker who lost his hand on a job in Portugal just as the financial crisis of 2009 was wreaking havoc all over the world. His lost hand is still somewhere out there, a rogue phantom limb, working invisibly.

Wendelien van Oldenborgh, Pertinho de Alphaville, 2010, slide projection with soundtrack, 20min
In this work the massive strikes in the São Paulo industries of the late 70's form a background for reflecting today's changing conditions of labour and the effect this has on the contemporary self. The film was made through encounters with a group of women working in a jeans factory near Alphaville São Paulo.