Off-History
Single channel HD video
19:11 min.
2014
The video-essay Off-History presents as its central ‘character’ an unfinished building located at the port of Piraeus, Greece's main harbour. The narrative of the film departs from newsreel footage shot in 1972 documenting the 'sanctification of water' in the harbour of Piraeus during Easter celebration. Throughout the clip the Piraeus Tower appears repeatedly in the background of the image and thus situates the ”off” in relating to an already written history. The “off”, in Off-History constitutes a position that wishes to shift the focus within a historical document by focusing on its margins. As a way of reading history from the backgrounds of the images, that constructs it. It take a second look at already existing narratives inspired by the concept of ”the off-modern”, a term invented by Russian/American artist Svetlana Boym.
Throughout the film the empty tower is used as a navigator or a map of site-specific memory. Off-History address the relation between a political history at large and a private everyday relation to it. The modern ruin becomes a physical sign of political and social signifier within the urban landscape. An anti-monument that seems to question the certain idea of modernization it was suppose to promote.
Installation: Kunsthal Charlottenborg (Photos by Anders Sune Berg)
