LANGUAGE AND BEYOND
Panorama
On translations and interpretation. How matters of language and cultural differences change the course of personal and world history.
NO POWER TO PUSH UP THE SKY
Lana Lin
VIDEO / 00:22:30 / USA / 2001
Lin convincingly explains the problems involved in writing objective history. Facing the camera, fifteen people try to translate into English the Chinese text of the interview which student leader Chai Ling gave on 28 May 1989, and which would play such a crucial role in the Tiananmen Square protests a week and a half later.
Their difficult attempts are combined with Western headlines about the events. A fragment from a 1996 talk show in which Chai Ling speaks on the controversy which the official translation of her statements caused is used as a footnote.
SO FAR, SO GOOD
Andreas Gedin
VIDEO / 00:04:20 / SWEDEN / 2002
A man tries desperately to describe the action taking place out of shot to a second man who is eating a pizza.
BEYOND LANGUAGE
Igor Sevcuk
VIDEO / 00:30:00 / THE NETHERLANDS / 2002
Poetic low-tech work on the no-man’s-land between cultures and language as a remnant of lost identity. This work won Sevcuk the Prix de Rome 2002.