European Souvenirs live cinema at Imagining Europe

Five young European media-makers came together at the Imagining Europe event -  as part of Doc Next Network, and curated by Seville-based ZEMOS98 - to bring us a live cinema performance European Souvenirs. Karol Rakowski (PL), Barış Gürsel (TR), Farah Rahman (NL), Malaventura (ES) and Noriko Okaku (UK/JP) took the audience on an unforgettable journey that questioned the very meaning of what it is to be European.

European Souvenirs artists Karol Rakowski, Barış Gürsel, Farah Rahman, Malaventura and Noriko Okaku © Ricardo Barquín Molero
European Souvenirs artists Karol Rakowski, Barış Gürsel, Farah Rahman, Malaventura and Noriko Okaku © Ricardo Barquín Molero

During the past few months, the artists have been on residencies in Seville, Istanbul, Warsaw and Amsterdam, where they worked with audiovisual materials from different European archives, looking into a more inclusive and complete idea of Europe. By re-mixing this media, they reviewed, re-investigated and re-considered prevailing imagery of (im)migrants in European societies and re-mapped Europe visually, geographically and mentally.

Opening with the Marcel Proust quote, “The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeing new landscapes, but in having new eyes,” the sell-out crowd Imagining Europe was taken on a journey through familiar and unfamiliar landscapes as the five up and coming young media-makers delved into some of Europe’s leading film archives to create a live performance that remixed music, photography and film.

The artists worked with audiovisual material from leading European institutions who opened up their archives for this project: Eye Film Institute (Amsterdam), OVNI Archives and Filmoteca de Andalucía (Seville), Digital National Archive (Warsaw), SALT (Istanbul) and the British Film Institute (London).

Malaventura, Karol Rakowski, Farah Rahman, Noriko Okaku and Barış Gürsel © ECF / Jan Boeve
Malaventura, Karol Rakowski, Farah Rahman, Noriko Okaku and Barış Gürsel © ECF / Jan Boeve

European Souvenirs has been funded with support from the European Commission. It reflects the views of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained therein.