Neo_Celebration

	Video extract — «Neo_Celebration2» by Laurence Vale, 2007
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For over ten years, I have been involved in audiovisual and multi-media projects related to the cultural pluralities and ethnic diversities, which have influenced me throughout my life. 

Pygmy-celebration, Paris 2005

”Neo_Celebration1” is part of a video series ”Neo_Celebrations” about the cultural collective representations of the different foreign and native, non-Western communities, living in Western capitals, that questions more deeply my relation to the foreign from the point of view of the Western woman artist that I am.

Of French Nationality, born and raised in Morocco, I could distinguish between the various languages, sounds, smells, rhythms, colors and skin tones at an early age. As children, however begrudged by our parents, we interacted freely with each other - Muslims, Jews and Roman Catholics. 

Ganesh-celebration, Paris 2007

For sometime now I have been living in the North East of Paris in a pleasant, tension free, multi-cultural, multi-racial environment. The various communities tolerate each other. African men dance in front of Chinese restaurants during Ramadan without anybody taking offense ... However, despite this tolerance, it seems that there is no real inter-cultural exchange. There is no true community spirit or curiosity between the different cultures.
It is by capturing with my Western perspective the different rituals and ceremonies practiced by these different communities that I want to express my lack of knowledge about them. 

Ganesh-celebration, Paris 2007

By combining these images and sounds by way of editing I hope to transcribe how difficult it is to put meaning into what I see and to access through this subjective interpretation the elaboration of a form of representation about a crossbred reality.

I am not an anthropologist, a sociologist, or seeking to make a documentary. I am just trying to emotionally describe all the sensations, questions, and impressions that the omnipresence of different cultures creates in my everyday life. What do I know about my Chinese, Arab, or Indian neighbors? What do I know and understand about their culture? Nothing or next to nothing! 

Ganesh-celebration, Paris 2007

During the fall of 2004, in Paris 18th district, the Indian community orchestrated a tribute to Ganesh, the Hindu god of good behavior and kindness. I filmed this long and beautiful ceremony where colored carts, driven by young Indians and laden with offerings such as flowers and fruit, meander slowly through the sound of percussive instruments and the mist of smells created by the burning incense.

As part of a very excited crowd, I filmed the various stages of this celebration, feeling all the intensity and energy generated. As I know very little about Hinduism, it was difficult to grasp the symbolic representation of this manifestation! For example, what did the flowerpot and peacock feathers balanced on the womens ’ head mean, and the coconuts violently broken on the tarmac by men stripped to the waist?  

Ganesh-celebration, Paris 2007

During the editing, I spontaneously felt the need to considerably slow down these images, as if to attempt to discover in them the answer to my questions. Keeping only a few realistic sounds, I replaced the remaining soundtrack with a contemporary electronic music composition.
This was a way of taking a cultural distance, not just out of respect but also certainly out of precaution; conscious of my ignorance and all that I did not perceive during the ceremony.
Taking this distance allowed me to re-interpret this cultural manifestation within the visual space of the screen.

text and video stills by Laurence Vale, 2007 

 

[ Video extract : «Neo_Celebration1» ]

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