Insolite
2019
HD video, 12:16, colour and black & white, sound
Insolite sounds like a name of a stone but it is not, it means odd, unsual.
A series of images from today and 1944’s last eruption of Mount Vesuvius mingle together, following no specific narrative. It becomes an enumeration of places in high tension, under surveillance and covered in lava. Is the mountain living or is it fear that creates the illusion of underground tremors?
Maya Schweizer
Maya Schweizer, born in Paris in 1976, studied art and art history in Aix-en-Provence, at the Academy of Fine Arts Leipzig (HGB) and at the University of the Arts (UdK) in Berlin. Schweizer works with different media, with a particular focus on experimental videos. In her films and sound works, she investigates the structures and processes of memory, exposing their narratives and identity-forming functions. In doing so, she always proceeds from a quasi-ethnological research on site. Her videos have been selected for numerous festivals and events, including the 67th Berlinale (2016), the Vancouver International Film Festival (2017, 2019) and the 52nd, 62nd, 65th and 66th International Short Film Festival Oberhausen (2006, 2016, 2019, 2020), where L’étoile de mer was awarded the e-flux prize in 2019. Schweizer works in Germany and France.