Bergman in Uganda

Inspired by and often using pre-existing material, Swedish artist Makus Öhrn creates challenging video installations and performances. He does so too with Bergman in Uganda, which presents a non-Western way of watching movies to a European audience. The video hall, a kind of cinema in the slums of Kampala, Uganda, is no more than a shed with a TV and some couches. Very few people from the slums can afford their own TV or DVD player, so this is their way of watching movies together. The star of these film events is the VJ. The VJ translates, frames the story to a Ugandan point of view and entertains: if it gets bland or irrelevant, he starts adding things and making jokes.

Öhrn wondered what would happen if VJs in Uganda turned to Ingmar Bergman's typically European film Persona. The unique film installation Bergman in Uganda places the audience in the zone between the real film Persona and the inhabitants of Kampala's largest slum who watch the film in a barn with VJ commentary. As this video jockey highlights Ingmar Bergman's masterpiece, he makes an apt comparison between life in a slum and life in a Swedish summer house.

The installation is presented by Explore the North, Stadsschouwburg De Harmonie, Arcadia and the Northern Film Festival. It is part of a collaboration in which adventurous international artists are collectively introduced to Fryslân in the coming years. Markus Öhrn will be part of Arcadia next year with a new project.