Catalogue > At random

‘Green Storm’ depicts actors and filmmakers rehearsing scenes in a tree nursery situated at the edge of the desert in Egypt. The film’s location is a metaphor for a traditional green screen studio. ‘Green screens’ are primarily used in filmmaking to replace or remove specific backgrounds. While filming in green screen studios, actors can’t directly interact with their surroundings; the consequences of their actions become evident only in post-production. In the film, the ‘green screen’ metaphor is a critique of our relation to nature - one where we don’t immediately see or understand the impact of our interactions. Today, the lush greenery serves as a backdrop of political discourse. This film explores the uncanny green connection to examine the politics of screening and greening. Between natural disaster films announcing dramatic upheavals and the shocking announcement of current climate scientists, the boundaries have become very blurry.

The collectif_fact comprised Annelore Schneider and Claude Piguet. They live and work between London and Geneva. Their projects, mainly video based, are often a deconstruction of what we see as cinematic codes within our visual culture. They are fascinated with the daily repetition, stereotypes and clichés that suffuse our popular culture. They deal mainly with aspects of (anti)spectacle, simulacra, and appropriation. To do so, they investigate the ways that narrative can be appropriated, disrupted, and re-edited to construct different stories and alternative meanings. Their videos frequently use the spectator’s ability to construct stories from ruptured narrative fragments. In fact, their videos weave together a complex mesh of references: fragments of dialogues, citations, and music extracts. A collage of recognizable, familiar images with a multitude of allusions to cinema classics. Collectif_fact play with our desire to be gripped and even deceived by images and stories. By creating works that appropriate cinematic codes and strategies, they encourage the viewer to reflect critically on the habits that condition our perceptions of reality. The artists are represented by Wilde Gallery, Geneva www.collectif-fact.ch