Salam Godzilla

Video Essay

Agadir, Morocco, 1960. A violent earthquake destroyed the whole town, except for a few buildings, including the Salam movie theater. By a strange twist of fate, apparently the film shown that night was Godzilla: King of the Monsters, a famous figure of post-apocalyptic days. This coincidence guides Gilles Aubry, all ears to echoes of the past, as he leads an investigation and tries to spot distant or tenuous traces left by time.

This video essay features rich material, where dinosaur tracks, newsreels, or even seismic surveys can resonate with poetic verses sung by the Agadiri musician and local cultural agent Ali Faiq, or the movements of female rwais dancers. Shot inside the cinema and in the surroundings of Agadir, the film is driven by an abstract soundtrack recorded on location.

Shot and produced by Gilles Aubry in 2019.
40'35'', HD video

World premiere at Visions du Réel International Film Festival, Nyon, 2019.
International premiere at FID Marseille 2019.
Moroccan premiere at Arab Media Lab, Marrakesh, 2020.

This video is part of the Norient Online Special Sawt, Bodies, Species, a joint publication with adocs, extending Gilles Aubry’s physical book Sawt, Bodies, Species: Sonic Pluralism in Morocco into a digital publication with additional video and audio materials. The Open Access publication of this book was made possible with the support of the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF).

Biography

Gilles Aubry is an artist, musician, and researcher based in Lausanne and Berlin. He creates installations, films, performances, and radio pieces which explore the cultural, ecological and affective dimensions of sound and listening. He has an MA in sonic arts from the Berlin University of the Arts (UDK) and recently completed a doctoral thesis on sound, aurality, and ecological voices in Morocco. His works have been presented in numerous international festivals and art institutions, including the Marrakech Biennale (2014), documenta_14 in Kassel (2017), and Reina Sofia Museum in Madrid (2020). Follow him on Instagram, and on his Website.

Published on May 04, 2023

Last updated on September 18, 2023

Topics

City

Nature

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Sawt, Bodies, Species

Snap

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And Who Sees the Mystery

Video Essay

by Gilles Aubry,

Zouheir Atbane

In 1959 Paul Bowles recorded an ahwash music performance in the village Tafraout in Morocco. Following the repatriation in 2010 of the Paul Bowles Moroccan Music Collection from Washington DC to Tangier, Gilles Aubry and Zouheir Atbane undertook collaborative research on the reception of these recordings in today’s Morocco.

This film documents the authors’ residency in Tafraout. In exchange with local musicians, the artists deliver an interpretation of the return of these music recordings to their location of origin, including the documentation of listening sessions, discussions, and music sessions. The work examines the micro-politics of invisibility: Paul Bowles as an «invisible spectator»; the veil as a strategy of resistance during the French occupation of Morocco; the Pythagorean curtain of French acousmatic music.

Shot and produced by Gilles Aubry, 2013.
27'01'', HD video

World premiere at ESAV Marrakesh, as part of the exhibition Why Ain’t You Rich if You’re so Smart, 2014.

This video is part of the Norient Online Special Sawt, Bodies, Species, a joint publication with adocs, extending Gilles Aubry’s physical book Sawt, Bodies, Species: Sonic Pluralism in Morocco into a digital publication with additional video and audio materials. The Open Access publication of this book was made possible with the support of the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF).

Biography

Gilles Aubry is an artist, musician, and researcher based in Lausanne and Berlin. He creates installations, films, performances, and radio pieces which explore the cultural, ecological and affective dimensions of sound and listening. He has an MA in sonic arts from the Berlin University of the Arts (UDK) and recently completed a doctoral thesis on sound, aurality, and ecological voices in Morocco. His works have been presented in numerous international festivals and art institutions, including the Marrakech Biennale (2014), documenta_14 in Kassel (2017), and Reina Sofia Museum in Madrid (2020). Follow him on Instagram, and on his Website.

Biography

Zouheir Atbane, born 1983 in Casablanca, is a contemporary dancer and sound artist. Starting with the study of Gnawa music, Zouheir’s art practice has developed through his numerous collaborations with Casablanca based dance company 2k_far and other artists. He now works as a freelance sound artist. Follow him on Instagram.

Published on May 04, 2023

Last updated on September 18, 2023

Topic

Encounter

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Sawt, Bodies, Species

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The Binding Effect

Video Essay

by Gilles Aubry

As part of the research project on sound, ecology, and seaweed production, this video documents a collective baking session with a group of women who collect seaweed for a living in Sidi Bouzid on the Moroccon Atlantic coast. Baking sweets with agar powder, one of the many products generated from red seaweed, becomes an opportunity for conversations on seaweed life, marine ecology, and human labor.

The video shows the participative approach of the research project as one of the women, working with seaweed, hosted a collective baking session to experiment with agar powder. The binding quality of agar powder became effective not only on a chemical, culinary level, but also through the production of social interactions.

Shot and produced by Gilles Aubry in 2021.
15'51'', HD video

This video is part of the Norient Online Special Sawt, Bodies, Species, a joint publication with adocs, extending Gilles Aubry’s physical book Sawt, Bodies, Species: Sonic Pluralism in Morocco into a digital publication with additional video and audio materials. The Open Access publication of this book was made possible with the support of the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF).

Biography

Gilles Aubry is an artist, musician, and researcher based in Lausanne and Berlin. He creates installations, films, performances, and radio pieces which explore the cultural, ecological and affective dimensions of sound and listening. He has an MA in sonic arts from the Berlin University of the Arts (UDK) and recently completed a doctoral thesis on sound, aurality, and ecological voices in Morocco. His works have been presented in numerous international festivals and art institutions, including the Marrakech Biennale (2014), documenta_14 in Kassel (2017), and Reina Sofia Museum in Madrid (2020). Follow him on Instagram, and on his Website.

Links

Gilles Aubry: «Atlantic Ragagar» (Experimental Film)

Published on May 04, 2023

Last updated on June 20, 2023

Special

Sawt, Bodies, Species

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