World festival premiere

Arabic with English subtitles

The fifth chapter of the series Who Is Afraid of Ideology? delves into the history of animal movement, settlement and labour starting from a pre-capitalist moment in Mount Lebanon. The film identifies the law that provides the right of passage for animals across private property as the beginning of the organisation of animal movements. The development of animal settlements coincided with the beginning of colonisation and the capitalist mode of production, leading to the transformation of the region, its property laws as well as its relationship to land and animals in rural areas. The project connects land privatisation with the semi-industrial settlement of animals, introducing a more fictional dimension where the political animal (human) and the animal seem to meet in this dreamlike space, connecting this to animality and dehumanisation as strategies of colonial violence. Staged fiction and documentary intertwine, reflecting upon the forms of movement and settlement throughout the film. The film attempts to reimagine the cinematic medium through a topographical and geological lens, positioning the camera as a passing animal. The series will continue to develop in dialogue with displaced, landless female farmers to explore another dimension of passage, law, land and movement.

The screening will be followed by a conversation with Marwa Arsanios (in English).

• Sektion Section: Artist in Focus. Marwa Arsanios
• Programm Programme: Programme 4