Nashashibi, Rosalind
Rosalind Nashashibi's Midwest is at once recognisable as the American urban backdrop we see constantly on television or in movies. Indeed much of the power of her film resides in the familiarity of the landscapes she documents. However, her lingering, meditative shots, filmed during a residency in Omaha in Nebraska, allow us to study that landscape and its communities in far greater detail. She focuses on workers huddled together in a cafe or congregating outside a welfare office, creating a sense of time drifting by. Her sense of composition, the rhythm of her editing and her choice of idle moments begin to describe a more diverse, flawed and complicated reality behind the mythic image.
In Midwest, form is a driving force, though in an oblique way. As the rhythm of the work slows down and magnifies our awareness of detail, new perceptions emerge. There is time to dwell on the nature of form and gesture, however, Nashashibi is careful to leave the interpretation of these revelations to the viewer.
- Artwork Details: running time: 11 minutes
- Edition: 1 of 3
- Material description: digi-beta tape, DVD
- Credit line: Rosalind Nashashibi © The artist and Sinibad Films ltd
- Theme:
- Medium: Film and Audio Visual
- Accession number: ACC44/2003