Reflections of Things Unseen


(BALi, KulturBahnhof Kassel)

Cinema has different levels of visibility. It can capture and depict things and people. But as a relationship between images, it can also bring relationships to the screen – and it can create new images to make tangible what cannot be easily seen. A disturbing image circulating on social media, a mining pit in Morocco that officially no longer exists, experiences of alienation and exclusion in a Swiss village, the supposed invisibility of aging women. Four attempts to look at what lies behind the images. (Sebastian Markt)

Man Number 4

CN: Violence Gaza, December 2023. A confrontation with a disturbing photograph on social media triggers questions about what it means to be an onlooker.… >>>

  • Duration: 10 Min.
  • Director: Miranda Pennell

l'Mina

The mines in the Moroccan city of Jerada have been officially closed since 2001. However, mining has continued in an informal economy ever since. Together with workers, Randa Maroufi has developed a collaborative approach that allows her to reconstruct the work in the mine, the memories of struggles, and the stubbornness of the local population, condensing them into impressive images. She does so without endangering their safety and at the same time revealing the political core of collective activities.

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  • Duration: 26 Min.
  • Director: Randa Maroufi

Our Name Is Foreigner

Bit by bit, a family living room is brought out of private life and into the public sphere: carpets and furniture, people take their seats, hot çay is served. Selin and her siblings Hêlîn, Firat, and Serhat grew up in a small Swiss village. They share memories, talk about experiences of alienation and exclusion, about anger and stubbornness, about standing together and insisting on their own story. An act of cinematic visualization of self-assertion.

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  • Duration: 21 Min.
  • Nominated: A38-Production Grant Kassel-Halle
    • Director: Selin Besili

    Texas Switch

    “Texas Switch” is a term used to describe a cinematic trick in which a stunt double replaces an actor without it being easily noticeable. In Darren Dominique Heroux’s film, women talk about visibility and invisibility in a broader sense: gendered gazes, perceptions of age, social invisibility. Heroux uses the possibilities of cinema to make people and things disappear or appear in an almost magical way for a cinematic reflection on the broader social significance of seeing and being seen, on what disappears in a life and what remains.

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    • Duration: 9 Min.
    • Director: Darren Dominique Heroux