Empreintes cinétiques

Rachel Echenberg

On April 27, 2023 at 7 pm

The screening will be preceded by the opening of the exhibitions I'm Not Your Kinda Princess by Lori Blondeau and Fair Trade by Alexandre Erre, from 5 to 7 pm.

As part of the dv_vd evenings, Vidéographe and Dazibao are pleased to present a series of video works by Rachel Echenberg curated by Denis Vaillancourt.

The screening will also be an opportunity to meet the visual artist who will talk about her creative process.

Program

1- Immobility — Time and Transformation

12 hours (2001) — 7 min. 48 sec.rt, 2001

On a cold winter morning, a woman is walking down the street and then suddenly stops and stays still for the rest of the day. The world bustles around her, passers-by and cars pass by, some stop, including the police. With her eyes closed, her presence is unshakeable. Her stillness is captured by the passing of the day, twelve hours of action/non-action.

Blanket: Snow (2003) — 4 min. 42 sec.

Shot in Parc Lahaie in Montreal during a snowstorm in March 2003. The video follows the action from a distance as Rachel Echenberg walks to a park bench and lays down for several hours. The image and sound continually move inwards as her body becomes covered by the falling snow.

Couple (2021) — 3 min. 30 sec.

A couple faces the other from individual islands as the tide goes out, revealing that they are on a single ground.

2- Portrait — Giving Shape to Sensation

Portraits de Spectateurs (2009) — 7 min. 

Sixteen video portraits of people filmed in front of television sets, evident through the light reflected against the person’s skin. The state of watching, and not being watched, creates neutral expressions on their faces that open up towards the possibility for physical transformation; crying, laughing, falling asleep, sweating and nosebleeds become the visible and visceral responses seemingly caused by what they are watching.

How to explain performance art to my teenage daughter (2018) — 6 min.

Mother and daughter embrace the difficult intricacies of explaining art to each other through an intimate action. This is intercut with a straightforward description of Joseph Beuys’ well-known 1965 performance, How to Explain Pictures to a Dead Hare. Absurdity and tenderness merge to reveal understanding as a sensory activity.

Family Portrait (2016) — 2 min. 10 sec.

A series of stills taken while each family member blew up their own weather balloon. The balloons expanded to the point of blocking out each individual and pushing the bodies apart.

3- Landscape — Intimate Scale

Hernaford Rd or the Distance to Sleep (2004) — 6 min. 42 sec.

In Hernaford Rd. or the Distance to Sleep two cameras and the artist’s young daughter are strapped to her body as she walks down a wooded path. This split screen video shows the two simultaneous points of view of the path in front of her and her child's face. The video is structured around the time, space and movement of the child falling asleep.

Conversation with my Husband (2021) — 1 min.
Conversation with my Adult Daughter (2021) — 3 min. 

Rachel Echenberg’s video series Conversations With My Family, attempts to gage the scale, weight, form and force of intimate interactions. This project measures familial connections against a variety of landscapes. The bodies create a disruptive presence within each natural setting, fluctuating our sense of time and scale. Echenberg presents one-to-one performances with her immediate family members. Each non-verbal conversation requires endurance and patience to structure a portrait of the relationship.

4- Comment tenir le vide

Comment tenir le vide (2023) — 10 min.

The central theme of loss in this performative video work is portrayed through the attempt to hold onto breakable and intangible elements: glass, wind, sand or intimate relationships. Although the video actions implicate some endurance, they mostly speak to poetic connections of care, dependency, and transformation.