Memory Palaces

Through dialectical associations of public and private archives, while questioning the ideological forces that shape the imagery of power specific to different historical periods and political regimes, the films included in this program weave together myths and folklore, personal memories and historical facts, and celebrate the power of memory as a tool of political resistance, reflecting at the same time on the reactionary use of the politics of memory. WHO WAS HERE? uses AI and family archives to fill in the gaps of personal history, playfully challenging the fear of technological overreach by reframing speculation not as danger, but as an inherent act of remembrance. In KOKI, CIAO, a yellow-crested cockatoo—once Tito’s pet and now a lonely zoo relic—embodies Yugonostalgia. Trapped in compulsive mimicry, Koki becomes a living metaphor for an epic past reduced by the present to a series of empty meaningless slogans. SLET 1988 re-assambles archival footage of one of the final mass performances in Yugoslavia through an autofictional lens that reveals the first fractures in a soon-to-collapse state. J-N-N layers memories and facts in a kaleidoscopic portrait of Iraq and its lands, conjuring ancient myths and modern rumours to question the traces left behind by conflicts. And, finally, THE ORCHARDS blends personal testimonies and archives of life in Damascus’ now destroyed district of Basateen al-Razi, as well as repurposed regime propaganda imagery, thus rebuilding in the realm of cinema what was erased and proving that remembrance itself can be an act of resistance. Similar in nature to the memory palaces used in mnemonic practices, these films use fragmentary remains of spaces, images and symbols to conjure worlds of the past whose memory lives on through those who have inhabited them. (Oana Ghera)

Slet 1998

Maria Popivoda | Duration 22'

74-year-old dancer Sonja Vukićević moves through socialist-modernist spaces, her body echoing Yugoslavia’s last mass performance. Intertwined with a teenage girl’s diary from 1988, the film traces the shift from socialist collectivism to rising nationalism.

The Orchards

Antoine Chapon | Duration 25'

In 2015, in Damascus, the Basateen al-Razi district and its orchards were razed to the ground as punishment for the population’s uprising against the regime. Having lost everything, two former residents recall their neighborhood.

Who Was Here?

Evi Stamou | Duration 26'

To fill in the gaps and inconsistencies in her father’s biography, filmmaker Evi Stamou begins a correspondence with an artificial intelligence. From this conspiratorial and often impertinent exchange, possible and probable stories emerge, painting the portrait of a young dreamer, at a time when the Greek military junta was gaining power.

J-N-N

Ginan Seidl | Duration 19'

J-N-N is based on family conversations between the artist during a trip to Iraq and intensive research on the Jinn, the ephemeral entities that are deeply interwoven into the country's culture. Through a visual and fragmentary journey through the desert of Iraq, from Ur via Babylon to the secluded living rooms in Baghdad, the film questions a culture and society that has been torn apart by ongoing wars, civil wars, repression and terrorism.

Koki, Ciao

Quenton Miller | Duration 11'

Co-written and narrated by Koki, the 67 year old speaking cockatoo of Yugoslavia's former leader Tito, KOKI, CIAO features recordings made with the bird over four years and previously unseen images from state archives, including accounts of state visits from Nikita Khrushchev, Sukarno, the Ceaușescus and Gandhi, as well as celebrities like Sophia Loren and Carlo Ponti.