All That Is Solid

Louis Henderson

Collection: Single Titles

Tags: Image Processing, Post-colonialism, Technology, Television

“All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses his real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind.”

— Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto, 1848

A technographic study of e-recycling and neo-colonial mining filmed in the Agbogbloshie electronic waste ground in Accra and illegal gold mines of Ghana. The video constructs a mise-en-abyme as critique in order to dispel the capitalist myth of the immateriality of new technology — thus revealing the mineral weight with which the Cloud is grounded to its earthly origins.

"As technological progress pushes forward in the West, enormous piles of obsolete computers are thrown away and recycled. Pushed out of sight and sent to the coast of West Africa, these computers are thrown into waste grounds such as Agbogbloshie in Accra, Ghana. On arrival the e-waste is recuperated by young men, who break and burn the plastic casings in order to extract the precious metals contained within. Eventually the metals are sold, melted and reformed into new objects to be sold; it is a strange system of recycling, a kind of reverse neocolonial mining, whereby the African is searching for mineral resources in the materials of Europe. Through showing these heavy processes, the video highlights the importance of dispelling the capitalist myth of the immateriality of new technology to reveal the mineral weight with which the Cloud is grounded to its earthly origins."

— Louis Henderson

Pricing Information

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Prizes + Awards

Winner of The Barbara Aronofsky Latham Award for Emerging Video Artist, 53rd Ann Arbor Film Festival, USA, 2015

European Short Film Award – T-Mobile New Horizons International Film Festival, Wroclaw, Poland, 2015

Premiere

Kinemastik International Short Film Festival
Valletta

2014

Exhibitions + Festivals

10/2015 - Conversations at the Edge, Gene Siskel Film Centre, Chicago, USA

10/2015 - Les propriétés du sol, Espace Khiasma, Paris, France

10/2015 - The Cost of Wealth, Cinematek, Brussels, Belgium

08/2015 - International Competition, Fronteira International Experimental and Documentary Film Festival, Goiânia, Brazil

07/2015 - International Competition, Lago Film Festival, Revine Lago, Italy

05/2015 - Solo presentation, Platform, Stockholm, Sweden

04/2015 - Art Technology and the Natural World, Harn Museum of Art, Gainesville, USA

04/2015 - Out of Competition, Oberhausen International Short Film Festival, Germany

04/2015 - International Competition, IndieLisboa, Lisbon, Portugal

04/2015 - Out of Competition, Kino der Kunst, Munich, Germany

04/2015 - International Competition, EMAF - Osnabrueck, Germany

03/2015 - International Competition, 53rd Ann Arbor Film Festival, USA

03/2015 - From Coal to Gold, Dushanbe Art Ground, Dushanbe, Tajikistan

03/2015 - Out of Competition, Poznan Shortwaves festival, Poland

03/2015 - International Competition, Luxor African Film Festival, Egypt

02/2015 - Plastik - Artists' moving image festival, Galway, Ireland

01/2015 – Out of Competition, International Film Festival Rotterdam, Netherlands

01/2015 - Transmediale 2015, Haus der Kulteren Der Welt, Berlin, Germany

11/2014 - Time, a Hesitant Smile, Hackney Picturehouse, London, UK

11/2014 - VISIO, Lo Schermo dell'Arte, Florence, Italy

11/2014 - International Competition, Internationale Kurzfilmtage Winterthur, Switzerland

11/2014 - International Competition, Kassel Dokfest, Kassel, Germany

09/2014 - International Competition, 25fps Experimental Film Festival, Zagreb, Croatia

09/2014 - International Competition, Milano Film Festival, Italy

07/2014 - International Competition, Kinemastik International Short Fim Festival, Malta

04/2014 - 59eme Salon de Montrouge - Paris, France

Press

Tunnel Montage\ Stack Soliloquies

Hard and Soft Montage: NYFF Projections 2015, Part One

Related Titles

Lettres du Voyant

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