the month
Se faire tout un scénario
Comprised of works hand-picked by members of the Vidéographe team, video of the month explores Vidéographe's vast collection and offers insight into the team behind the centre. New month, new video.
Sarah Foulkes is a filmmaker and cultural worker. She is most interested in exploring labour, feminism(s) and narrativity through image and sound.
Synopsis
The splendors of reality and variations on the same theme.
A word from the team
A rhinoceros and two pigeons walk into a zoo and…not much happens.
This is precisely the pleasure of watching Manon Labrecque's bite-size video. Broken into three chapters, the video opens on a pair of pigeons who make way for the arrival of a rhinoceros as the 20th century fox theme blares. The theme evokes the beginning of a motion picture, but instead we're quickly ushered into "le dénouement” and then “la grande finale.” Is the drama to be found in the space between the title cards or should I be looking closer at the images themselves?
The rhinoceros and pigeons (who are diligently thanked in the credits) play leading roles in a drama of Labrecque's creation. I can picture Labrecque walking around the zoo and making up stories about the animals and inventing the interpersonal dramas of their lives. In that sense, there is a tyranny to Labrecque’s narrative and to narrative in general. It creates order where there isn't any or it excavates it from where it's hidden. And yet, where Labrecque creates meaning, she also finds a great deal of humour – as she so often does.
A rhinoceros and two pigeons walk into a zoo and…see it for yourself.
Sarah Foulkes
Collection and Sales Coordinator
