Shimmer, and Hand Me the Sky, and Hotel Tito

Nelson Henricks

Bow Island (Alberta), 1963

 

1995

7 min, sound

MNBAQ, purchase (2003.263)

 

In this video, Nelson Henricks transports us to a dreamlike, ghostly world in which he questions his own identity. This existentical quet includes his grandmother, his lover and the Canadian Prairies of his birth in a carrousel of revelatory images abou8t himself.

 

Claudie Gagnon

Montreal, 1964

 

19984 min, sound

 

MNBAQ, purchase (2009.87)

 

This video is infused with the burlesque atmosphere typical of Claudie Gagnon's universe. Hand Me the Sky, like an ode to the lifespan of love, scrolls through the everyday domestic life of a married couple. The scenes unfold under a cascade of snowflakes, as if in a snow globe. Time goes by the rhythm of La Paloma, a popular song by Sebastian Iradier themed on solitude and love.

 

Milutin Gubash

Novi Sad, Yougoslavia (now Serbia), 1969

 

2010

10 min 19 s, sound

MNBAQ, gift of the artist (2006.804)

 

In this video, Katarina Gubash, the artist's mother, unravels their family history in attempting to expolain why they immigrated. Viewers find themselves in a strange sitcom based on the honeymoon of the artist's parents. The absurdity of the events (the fake hotel, the actor's performances, Milutin's incursions into his mother's memory), like the oppressive nature of the situation described, provide insight into the disturbing context recounted by Gubash's mother. In this work, documentary and ficttional by turns, the artist acquaints us with the history of Yougoslavia during the Communist era under a political regimme, that imposed precarious conditions.

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Uploaded on February 4, 2019