Adrian Paci, Prova
Screening
In Competition
The complexity of expressing the narrative and its inmost being in words is reflected in Paci’s video work Prova. In this film he takes his earlier work Turn on (2004) as a starting point and works with the same protagonists, job- seekers from Shkodër in Albania. The backdrop is the concrete spine of a building that was never completed, in the middle stands a group of men who seem to be silently waiting. It is dark and the only source of light is the town’s street-lamps. A whole night long, from sunset to sunrise, the protagonists look at each other, smile or fall asleep on their feet.
The perceived silence is interrupted from time to time by the repeated call of the words “Prova, prova..” (“Test, test…”) spoken by the men into the microphones they hold as if at a soundcheck. It is as if they are waiting for their appearance, which however never comes. As soon as one of the men stops talking the narration is continued with glances, poses and gestures. Their body language and their faces marked by life tell a story that words cannot express. After a while the camera follows a group of horses and dogs for several minutes as they run freely through the streets and seem to mock the protagonists with their own liberal acting. It seems as if the animals are warning of the urgency of action and reflecting opportunities and freedom but also evoking the yearning to break out. A photograph was taken during the shooting of the film (color print, see invitation card) which will be on show in the gallery’s office space.
Courtesy the artist, kaufmann repetto, Milano e New York and Galerie Peter Kilchmann, Zürich
