Videoart feature
gender identity
French video art 2,3 & 4
Today, 21 January 2008, started in Lyon/France – Les Inattendus Film Festival – featuring a selection from CologneOFF I, the 1st CologneOFF Festival edition – previously launched in 2005. One year earlier in 2007, Wilfried had met the director of Les Inattendus on Budapest Shortfilm Festival, where his video
had been awarded as the best experimental video. The French festival director, jury-member in Budapest, invited Wilfried to present a selection about gender identity, among them
Wilfried’s course of life impressed people always, because whatever Wilfried did since his own launch on 1 January 2000, it was another mosaic stone to establish a new memory by dealing with the main topics “memory” and “identity”. So it was, when he met professional people on festivals, also now here in Lyon,, he started discussing about philosophical topics which were for him no mere theory or an intellectual game, but real serious practice. People could not believe, that Wilfried’s knowledge was not acquired during decades, but an expression of his spontaneous intellectual creativity – born in the very moment.
Wilfried had visited Lyon already once before the coma 1988, but 20 years later in 2008, it was as if it was the first time, and he found out in the very moment why he loved the French people in Lyon and disliked them at the same time. They liked to talk about things for their own sake, as an expression of the pleasure to discuss, even if the matter of discussion was (mostly) nonsense. So, in fact they did not understand, that Wilfried was not talking about things for their own sake, but he wanted to understand the context as a whole. After a while, Wilfried felt it was a waste of time and started feeling very uncomfortable, while for the others it was the contrary – they felt comfortable and relaxed.
He suddenly was remembering one of his brothers, who had been living since long time in Grenoble, a French city which is not far from Lyon, and why he disliked him, it was the same pleasure to talk about nonsense by discussing things for their own sake, it was as if he was trying to escape from reality and responsibility, because he was not able to talk about serious problems seriously, while Wilfried tried to re-understand reality and by doing so to reconstruct his own Past.
It was therefore no surprise, why Wilfried – accompanied by the director of Budapest Film Festival, invited to Lyon like Wilfried – was exploring cold Lyon in January 2008 – they were like-minded in the sense that they had the same ideas for communicating.
These ambivalent experiences, however, were standing in contrary to the excellent festival program and the vivid interest of the audience in the presentations of the invited guests, so visiting Lyon had many facets and inspiring moments influencing Wilfried’s view on mentalities and his artistic/curatorial work.
Les Attendus Festival programThe article is complemented by a
NewMediaFest2020 selection 2, 3 & 4 of French videoart
Frédéric Labonde (France) – Annunciation, 2013, 5:25 ***
Mickael Muraz (France) – as the Train Goes by, 2012, 3:00
Jean-Michel Rolland (France) – FIRST PERSON SHOOTER, 2012, 4’43
iaaai (France) – Pacience, 2006-2007, 4 min 10 sec
Caroline Pellet (France) – Guen, 2012, 9:59
Marie Magescas (France) – WAR desease, 2010, 8:26
Jerome Laniau (France) – Hakili Fila, 2013, 20:00
Dorianne Wotton (France) – Cold, 2012, 4:55
Raphael Blum (France) – Princesses Dream – Manila, 2011, 2:58
Tom de Pékin (France) – Les Majorettes, 2006, 6:00
Muriel Montini (France) – Future Anterior, 2006, 6:00
Melanie Perrier (France) – Hearing You Were Here, 2006, 0:50
Jimmy Owenns (France) – Tease, 2004, 7:00
