The Italian video artist manages to surprise with three short documentaries on the topic of work, that are reminiscent of riveting science fiction movies.
Thee is no need to attend the Venice Biennale to enjoy Yuri Ancarani’s work. You can simply take the metro to the Beursschouwburg. In the trilogy Human Machine, the film artist brings to the surface what is invisible in our society and manages to put previously unknown professions in the spotlight, each time focusing on the encounter between man and machine:
In Part One, we are transported to the marble quarries of the Italian city of Carrara. In an unreal science-fiction landscape, a man directs – in a deafening silence – a digger in the direction of a large chunk of marble that is about to fragment.
In Part Two, Ancarani meticulously records all the actions of the crew on a deep-sea platform; for three weeks, six scuba divers stayed alternately in the recompression chamber on board the platform Luna or were at work on the bottom of the ocean, all their actions being tied to very strict protocols.
Part Three offers a special insight into the wonderful world of the modern operating theatre, in which the patient appears to play a mere supporting role. The operation is performed by robotic arms that are operated by the surgeon by means of a joystick. A robot performing an operation on a human being is no longer science fiction. In fact, it is so real that it is the subject of a documentary.
Subtitles in English
In Italian
Il Capo, 2010, IT, 16 min
Piattaforma Luna, 2011, IT, 25 min
Da Vinci, 2012, IT, 25 min
Cast
: Franco Barattini, Marcello Casadei, Franca Melfi
Director: Yuri Ancarani
Sound: Mirco Mencacci
Original music: Wang inc., Ben Frost, Lorenzo Senni
Producers
: Maurizio Cattelan, Ivan Frioni, Giorgio Gallenzi, Antonella Boccanelli Rodriguez, Luca Soldati, Warly Tomei
