Film 08.04... 18.06.2006

Allora Jennifer & Calzadilla Guillermo

Jennifer Allora (USA, 1974) and Guillermo Calzadilla (Cuba, 1971) have been working together since 1995. They link together elements from various cultures and concepts. Starting from their individual backgrounds, both scientific and artistic, this artistic duo zooms in on current urban, economic, political, aesthetic and historical systems. Their interventions make it possible for the viewer to make connections between elements which in themselves have nothing to do with each other but which appeal to the imagination. They often formulate multiple proposals in the exhibition space, and make use of sculpture, photography, performance and film. The presentation in the S.M.A.K. is of two recent films, Returning a Sound from 2004 and Amphibious (Login-Logout) from 2005.

Both artists live in Puerto Rico, an island with a hybrid Caribbean culture and a colonial legacy, and which is part of the United States. Despite its tropical location and beautiful natural setting there is a great deal of heavy industry on the island. For a long time, the United States used some of the smaller islands for military exercises. Returning a Sound was filmed on Vieques, a small island adjacent to Puerto Rico, where for sixty years the US did exercises in military bombardment. This resulted in pollution, noise and health problems among the inhabitants. The bombardments ended in May 2003 and the film was shot in 2004. Returning a Sound is at once a sonic echo of the former soundscape, a celebration of the victory of the civil disobedience movement on the island and as well as a resounding call to attention and vigilance for its new struggle for ecological justice and sustainable development. With a trumpet attached to the exhaust of a moped criss-crossing the island, the vehicle becomes a counter-instrument whose emissions follow not from a preconceived score, but from the jolts of the road and the discontinuous acceleration of the bike’s engine. Variously evoking everything from the siren of an ambulance to experimental salsa or jazz music, the film’s protagonist acoustically reterritorializes areas of the island formerly exposed to ear-splitting detonations. In addition to this open political reflection on the present situation in Puerto Rico, the film above all displays simplicity and a powerful poetic imagery that appeals to the viewer even without a knowledge of the social history.

Amphibious (Login-Logout) from 2005 was filmed in the Pearl River delta in China and follows a group of tortoises that have been put on a tree trunk and are carried along by the current. The tortoises float slowly past the fast-moving network of sea and land, and import and export activities. Their slowness contrasts with the powerful undercurrent of capital and labour in the urbanised surroundings of the seaport, a place in China that seeks an entry into the globalised economy. The film is a sort of documentary in which the viewer is denied any commentary. The picture alternates between close-ups of the tortoises, which look as if they have been washed ashore from prehistoric times, and views of the modern industrial port. In the confrontation between nature and industry and past and present, Allora and Calzadilla raise a number of ecological topics without proposing any form of solution. The work is highly specific and emerges from a clearly defined complex local situation, but precisely in this capacity imparts something about broader issues, about economics, social networks and making power visible.

The work of Jennifer Allora and Guillermo Calzadilla has already been shown in numerous international exhibitions, recently including the 2004 Venice Biennale, the 2005 Lyon Biennale and the current Whitney Biennale.

'Amphibious (Login-Logout)' and 'Returning a Sound': courtesy of the artists and Galerie Chantal Crousel in Paris