Free entrance
In the framework of europalia georgia, Sophio Medoidze presents the films Let Us Flow and Xitana at beursschouwburg. The screening will be accompanied by a reading, in the presence of the artist.
Let Us Flow (ვიდინოთ) (premiere in Belgium)
A long poem to the mountains, Let Us Flow is a two-part feature that explores the isolated mountainous region of Tusheti, in North-east Georgia. It considers the importance of ritual, the maintenance of community ties, and how modernisation and migration are transforming rural landscapes. Shot over several years, Let Us Flow uses innovative audio-visual techniques to make visible the symbolic and physical division of sacred spaces within the community and offers a nuanced perspective on a culture where ancestral shrines are only accessible to men.
Medoidze is interested in linguistic parallels between Tushetian dialect and filmmaking jargon, between ‘hunting’ and ‘shooting’: Tushetians believe that odd years are governed by Goddess Dali, the protector of wild animals, and even years are St George’s years. Let Us Flow follows this structure as its two parts are shot in 2021 and 2022 respectively.
Let Us Flow (ვიდინოთ)
A film by Sophio Medoidze
63 min., 4K, color, sound, 2023
With English subtitles
CREDITS
Writer, director, camera and editing Sophio Medoidze
Composer Reso Kiknadze
Second camera Goga Devdariani
Additional footage Andro Eradze
Sound Ivane Gvaradze
Sound mix Sophio Medoidze
Color Nico Tarielashvili
Produced by Sophio Medoidze
Co-produced by Sakdoc film
With support from Arts Council England
and Georgian National film centre
Xitana (ხითანა)
The first film in Medoidze’s Tusheti Trilogy, Xitana is centred around a bareback horse race tradition in Tusheti mountains – a display of masculinity as much as of the fragility of the community trying to maintain its cultural integrity. Nowhere else is this conflict of desires more pronounced than during Atengenoba, the region’s traditional summer festivities, with young Tushetians looking increasingly more like the teenagers anywhere else, ditching their traditional dress for Norm-core.
Xitana (ხითანა)
A film by Sophio Medoidze
6 min., HD, color, sound, 2019
With English subtitles
CREDITS
Writer, director, camera and editing Sophio Medoidze
Music Reso Kiknadze and Tushetian people
Sound Tinatin Tsiskaradze, Nina Gabrava
Commissioned by Projections Commissions at Tyneside cinema
About the artist
Sophio Medoidze’s (b. Tbilisi, Georgia, lives and works in London) practice encompasses film, photography, writing and sculpture and explores the poetic potential of uncertainty. For a time, she worked anonymously as part of the Clara Emigrand collective, disseminating her work outside the gallery context. The desire for a community (both actual and imaginary) drives her narrative work, as she questions the interplay of rural and urban, languages and translations, as well as gender politics and dynamics. Her works often emerge from writing and unfold as installations incorporating moving image, sculpture, and text.
Medoidze’s films are known for their use of innovative audio-visual techniques, they have been screened at the international film festivals including short film festival Oberhausen and EMAF European Media art festival. Her work has been shown at Tate Modern, Centre d´art Contemporain de Brétigny, LUX London, Fondation Vincent van Gogh, Serpentine Gallery, Whitechapel Gallery, amongst others. A collection of her short stories Bastard Sun will be published by Distanz and Kona books in 2023. Medoidze’s films are distributed by LUX, London.
