Expired Monument, Story of a Culture Palace
2011 (w. Maija Rudovska)
Double channel HD video, color, sound
11 min 29 sec
Latvian Text by: Maija Rudovska | Editted by: Shirin Sabahi | Videography: Marcis Abele & Maris Zommers | Voice Over: Agnese Karklina | Sound Recording: Mute Studio, Riga | Translation of Latvian Text to English: Andris Mellakauls & Iliana Veinberga | Sound Recording: Mute Studio, Riga
The work is about VEF Culture Palace in Riga that was built close to the largest telephone factory in USSR to provide the workers with cultural events. VEF Culture Palace is one of the few buildings left from the Stalin era that is still functioning in the way that is was meant for. Most of the other buildings of the era are either abandoned or have been transformed for other practices. By means of close ups of the interior of the building and a narration, the building is set as an anchor for post-Soviet changes in the city. The building's presence in past, as manifestation of power and in present, as the reminder of the application of that power, resembles the ghost of Hamlet's father that appears to compel him to act on them.
© 2007-2011 Shirin Sabahi
