1. Urban, isolated and transplanted

Celeste (2007) 4’12” Valentina Serrati

Initially inspired in the novel The Hour of the Star, by Clarice Lispector, Celeste explores an alienated mental state provoked by physical and emotional isolation. Through performance acts, different spaces –usually high locations— in the center of Santiago de Chile are intervened and registered. The costume, full of Latin American references, floral designs and made by multiple layers (something very common in the Paraguayan countryside), impersonates the figure of Celeste, the foreigner. The shot composition explores notions of scale between body and the urban landscape, the monumentality of the chosen buildings establishes the positions of the body and the study of the pose. The time treatment is used as an expressive tool to show states of contemplation, inscrutability and apparent conflict, also shown in the use of the prosthesis “as if I had not eyes.” The word “Celeste” relates not only to the name of the character, but also to the vault of heaven, constructions within churches whose symbolic character lies in connecting earth and heaven.
http://www.valentinaserratisisa.blogspot.com/

Documental [Documentary, 2005] 2’ Alexander Apóstol

The huge oil wealth in Venezuela pushed an accelerated economic and urban growth in the city of Caracas in the fifties. The city developed following the principles of modern international architecture. Its great growth created important migratory currents: on the one hand there was a considerable flux of European immigrants who took residence and contributed to the development of the city; on the other, there was a huge migratory flux of poor people from the interior parts of the country. They lived in shanty towns built in the hills surrounding the narrow valley where the city is located. Nowadays, those shanty communities form a ring of misery that surrounds the formal city completely, and its number of inhabitants is the same or bigger than those living in the capital. A family group in one of the shacks in the outskirts of Caracas watches on the TV a historical documentary made in the fifties in which the birth of the new country and a new society in Venezuela are described, while countless scenes of modern constructions illustrate the process. The documentary is narrated by Renny Ottolina, a famous TV presenter, son of European immigrants, who maintained his popularity almost for three decades, to the point of being a presidential candidate in the seventies. Renny Ottolina died in a plane crash in the presidential campaign, and the causes of this accident never cleared up
http://www.alexanderapostol.com

Destablishing Shots (2007) 4’9” Jonathan Harker

Destablishing Shots, whose title comes from the film term “establishing shot” (a shot that starts and establishes the time and place in which a narrative sequence takes place), is originally made by a series of 23 static shots of different buildings in Panama city. At first sight, it seems that the shot just involve careful framings of houses and buildings, but gradually, their impossible symmetry (however incomplete) becomes more evident. The result is a disturbing portrait of an intervened and altered city (a direct reference to the construction boom that is currently taking place in Panama caused by the Spanish and North American property speculation, which is drastically, quickly and chaotically transforming the cityscape). The ambient sound, strangely devoid of people and cars, combined with the Muzak version of the classic song “Panamá Viejo,” (whose lyrics reflect upon the feelings generated by the ruins of the ancient colonial city, founded by Spanish conquerors in 1519 and sacked and destroyed by English pirates in 1671) also contributes to the video’s dream-like quality. A new beginning has been added to the second version of the video (exhibited for the first time the the 52nd Venice Biennale). In it, the feminine voice of a computer recites the lyrics of “Panamá Viejo.” I had to translate the text phonetically in order to make the computer repeat it (this translation appears in the screen while the computer’s voice says the text). As a result, the nostalgic lyrics of the song are pronounced with a marked gringo accent.
http://www.jonathanharker.com/destablishing-esp

Prelude for meditation (2006) 1’40” Edgar Endress

A watch tower as a symbol of power. A policeman performing his ritual. This piece is structured by John Cage composition, which reflects upon the transcendental quality of the music. This video takes these elements to add a gesture of poetic subversion to the power ritual, forcing a second look through the gesture/ritual music and watch tower/space.

Isla abierta [Open island 2006] 2’10” David Pérez (aka Karmadavis)

Karmadavis channelled his own veins, letting the catheters open while going down the walkway “El Conde” in Santo Domingo. A catheter in each arm, letting the blood flow. The body represents the island divided in two, the left arm stands for the Republic of Haiti and the right arm for the Dominican Republic.
http://performancelogia.blogspot.com/2007/08/david-prez-isla-abierta.html

Under discussion (2005), 6’14” Jennifer Allora (EEUU/Puerto Rico) y Guillermo Calzadilla (Cuba/Puerto Rico)

Under discussion stands for the current state of Vieques, Puerto Rico, an island the US Army and the NATO forces have been using for military maneuvers for 60 years. When the civil rights movement expelled the US Army from the island in 2003, the territory changed of owner and the management was transferred to the US Department of the Interior, Fish and Wildlife. This change left the initiatives of the civil organizations of the island in the deadlock. They have claimed that the territory should be cleared of all the toxic substances and the unexploded explosives that cover this coastal area, and asked for its return to the local authority and jurisdiction. The video follows Carlos Zenón (a local fisherman, leader of the Movimiento de Pescadores, a key movement in the seventies that started the movement of civil disobedience in the island of Vieques), who has transformed a round table into a boat, turning it upside down, and sailing it to the coastal areas of the island where the territory status is still under question. Putting the table in motion and turning it into a fishing boat, Zenón takes the debate to unforeseen new directions.
http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/alloracalzadilla/clip2.html
http://www.brooklynmuseum.org/exhibitions/infinite_island/highlight.php?a=EL51.56

The Borders Trilogy (2002) Alex Rivera. Part 1: Love on the Line 2’11”. Part 2: Container City 3’. Part 3: A Visible Border 2’30”

The Borders Trilogy tells three short stories to illustrate better a bigger story: the consequences of a world order where products go freely across borders that people cannot cross. The first story is set in a beach of the Pacific Ocean where the borders of Mexico and the US meet. In the shadow of a surrealistic metal wall separating both countries, a few families separated by the immigration policy meet around the wall, holding a transnational picnic. The second story is set in a completely different frontier town: Newark, New Jersey. Here the border crossing is exceeded. It is 50-feet long. It is made by metal containers that transport products to the US from the factories all around the world. This story shows the visible consequence of a border which is open to the market. The last story is centered on a singular, fascinating X-ray image showing the way in which the 21st Century immigrants are treated in the borders closed for them but open to products made in the third world. The Borders Trilogy (Love on the Line, Container City and A Visible Border) is a concise meditation on the contradictions of the frontier policy of the US.
http://www.invisibleamerica.com/borders.html
http://www.freewaves.org/artists/a_rivera/ http://www.sixthsection.com/page-video.html

Estimados vecinos [Dear Neighbors, 2006] 7’ Christian Bermúdez

Oslo, Norway. An ordinary house in an ordinary neighborhood was painted with fuchsia and white stripes. A year later, a letter was sent to the neighbors explaining the reasons for such decision. The same letter was used as a script for this film that deals with subjects such as identity, immigration, and the use of art in an original way, outside the conventional gallery. “The piece have not been translated and subtitled in Spanish on purpose. The reason is that it looks for a negotiation space for the language as well. English is not my mother language, and it is not Norway’s either. However, when we use it a connection is established on a neutral ground, and this is something inherent to the piece. A Spanish version of the letter used for the film production is provided. Such letter could be used in an eventual exhibition.” Christian Bermúdez.
http://madc.ac.cr/galerias/videos/bermudez/index.html http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TO_0GUWTQA

2. Latinos in the art market

Videoart: The Iberoamerican Legend (2002), 13’32”, The Iberoamerican Trilogy (Parte I) Martín Sastre

Videoart: The Iberoamerican Legend begins in the year 2492 when a frozen artist wakes up from a long sleep to tell us how Ibero-American video art saved humanity from the “World crisis of dreams” and how the age of “Ultrareal entertainment” caused Hollywood’s fall
http://www.martinsastre.com/

No-Latin Party (2003) 2’16” Diego Lama

Taking one of the most iconic and important scenes of The Godfather, the artist subverts the scene placing the logo of the Venice Biennale on top of the cake the characters share out. The chosen soundtrack –Carmen Miranda “South America Way”— ironically refers to a Latin American context, in order to criticize the lack of importance that this kind of events gives to peripheral countries. Nowadays, with the trend in the international art market for “the exoticism of the periphery,” the reading is still critical, but the direction has radically changed: right now everyone shares out the Latin American cake.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPYhKw96D2c
http://www.videobrasil.org.br/ffdossier/ffdossier006/ind.htm

3. Epílogo

Pelota [Ball, 2003] 9” Douglas Rodrigo Rada

Black and white, 9 seconds video. In it, someone hits a ball against a wall, and when the ball bounces, it hits someone else’s head.
http://bloque0.blogspot.com/2008/03/douglas-rodrigo-rada-batiscafo-cuba.html