BLAST • How to tell a story and why we should tell it in a certain way?

Urbspicta, in collaboration with Careof and LOOP, presents How to tell a story and why we should tell it in a certain way?, a workshop by Diego Tonus and Elisa Caldana organized within BLAST. estetiche della violenza tra immagine, video e documento, curated by Jessica Bianchera and Marta Ferretti.

How to tell a story and why we should tell it in a certain way? (Come raccontare una storia e perché raccontarla in un certo modo?) is a recurring question within Topography of Terror, a series of works by Diego Tonus and Elisa Caldana started in 2017 and currently composed of two episodes, Topography of Terror (19.12.2016) and Never Again. The two films implemented the use of CGI (Computer-Generated Imagery) for the visualization of the never-built building Topographie des Terrors, originally designed for the city of Berlin by Swiss architect Peter Zumthor, and investigate the role and effect of the violent imagery of terrorism spread through news, social media, and the non-places of the Internet. Tonus and Caldana conceive Topography of Terror as an open cycle, whose conceptual center will produce over the years a series of new works further elaborating on the idea of mental images and repetition, taking into account the nature and forms of contemporary terrorism that are part of recurring historical processes and an eternal return of violence.

The workshop, which will take place online over two weekends, aims to deepen the central themes addressed in the cycle, such as post-truth and journalistic narrative, together with a group of students from the Accademia di Belle Arti and the University of Verona, with particular attention to the relationship between the real and virtual body, personal and collective, within this new semi-dystopian reality in which the Covid-19 pandemic forced individuals during the lockdown—a critical period of reconfiguration of priorities, adaptation, and development of new ways of thinking. In this particular historical moment, the workshop proposes to interrogate the aesthetic and political potential of video techniques, which have been used to cope with the limits of social isolation, and their influence on the perception and use of information in everyday life. Specifically, the ways in which moving images can mediate, restitute, narrate, modify, and distort reality.

Through practical exercises and the development of an idea, participants will be invited to work in pairs (one ABAV student with one UNIVR student) to create a project composed of both a curatorial part (textual development of conceptual aspects) and the production of their own video using techniques that actively question the use of the medium, such as creating a script by modifying or editing existing web content; real-time image post-production; call delays; fast-forwarding videos/films and accelerated timings; using the webcam as a camera to shoot a film. The project outcomes of the workshop will be presented during the second week and evaluated by a commission that will award the pair with the best project a double training prize to be experienced at Careof and LOOP.

Discover the full workshop program
Register for the workshop by April 1, 2021
Discover BLAST. estetiche della violenza tra immagine, video e documento

Photo credit: Elisa Caldana and Diego Tonus, Topography of Terror (19.12.2016), 2017, CGI film, full HD, color, surround sounds, 31 min.