ROBERT FENZ - MEDITATIONS ON REVOLUTION

Robert Fenz (b.1969) explores the border between documentary and primitive cinema and builds his films along predetermined guidelines where contemplation replaces any form of speech. “My need to think or feel something through film,” he notes, relating to his own experimental cinematic techniques, “is not reactionary against video, but a concern for film’s disappearance as a material.” Silent, while presented with recordings of natural sound, Meditations on Revolution (1997-2000) is a short film in five parts, shot in 16mm black-and-white. Based mainly on his trips, Fenz portrays street scenes in Central and Old Havana, interweaving everyday events with fragments of Mexican tradition. He films Rocinha, the largest Brazilian favela, as a metaphor for an abandoned revolution. In this (meta)physical journey, New York City’s alienating landscape is surveyed via a monologue, and a boxer becomes the symbol of the individual’s struggle. Ultimately, in these films, life is lived forward but understood backwards.

Meditations on Revolution Part I : Lonely Planet. 1997, 16mm, 13’, b&w, silent.
Meditations on Revolution Part II : The Space in Between. 1997, 16mm, 8, b&w, silent.
Meditations on Revolution Part III : Soledad. 2001, 16mm, 15’, b&w, silent.
Meditations on Revolution Part IV : Greenville, MS. 2001, 16mm, 30’, b&w, silent.
Meditations on Revolution Part V : Foreign City. 2003, 16mm, 32’, b&w, English spoken.