Catalogue > At random

Theoria is the Greek word for talking about something witnessed. If, during ancient times, someone during a travel experienced an extraordinary event a theoria was performed when the witness returned home. Philosophers talked in terms of "ritualized visuality" that received a political significance where the person lived, and the important part of a theoria was the social situation when the witness shared his experiences. The theoria that is dealt with in the film is based on the events that took place in a suburb of Stockholm, Tensta, in August 2012. A young girl borrowed her mother’s smartphone and took a photograph of a peculiar cloud in the sky. The image, that started to circulate on social media, was interpreted as an apparition of the Virgin Mary by many residents of Tensta. Thousands of people gathered in the local Syrian Orthodox church and again the miracle was witnessed, both in the condensation in the windows and in the trees outside the church. The story of the miracle in Tensta disappeared very quickly from mainstream media, but lived on different online discussion sites. In the film seven local residents perform a whispering reading of a manuscript written from these online discussions. The reading is combined with documentary footages from the church. The textual quality is emphasized and contrasted to the ecstatic situation and the documentary images where viewer has to ask her self what she is really seeing.

Magnus Bärtås is an artist, writer and professor of fine arts at Konstfack in Stockholm working with text, video, objects and installation. His dissertation in artist research, You Told Me – Work stories and video essays, was published in May 2010. Together with Fredrik Ekman he has published three books of essays. Their latest book, Alla monster måste dö (“All monsters must die”), was nominated to the Swedish national August prize. In 2010 his video essay Madame & Little Boy won the grand prize at Oberhausen International Short Film Festival. Recent exhibitions include “The Miracle in Tensta”, Tensta Konsthall, The 9th Gwangju Biennale 2012, and “ABCDEFGHI” at Marabouparken, Stockholm, 2013.