HiwaK – Pre Image: “Blind as the mother tongue”

Vienna Contemporary Cinema Prize 2017

“To remember, sometimes you need other archaeological tools says the voice over in Hiwa K’s Pre-Image (Blind as the Mother Tongue). The video depicts the artist walking across fields, wastelands, estates, going from Turkey to Athens and then to Rome, a path that mirrors his own journey as a child, when he fled Iraqi Kurdistan and reached Europe by foot. His “Pre-images” are fragments of a path whose final destination is uncertain.”

Written and narrated by Hiwa K
Camera: Constatnine Nisidis, Constantinos Hadzinikolaou
Editor and Sound Design: Steffen Martin
Additional Editor: Ben Brix
Voice Over Editor and Additional Sound Design: Alois Späth
Thanks to: Tommaso Sagramola
Commissioned by documenta 14
Produced by Openvizor, Abbas Nokhesteh