MICHELLE-MARIE LETELIER

«Modern bourgeois society, a society that has conjured up such gigantic means of production and exchange, is like the sorcerer who is no longer able to control the powers of the underworld that he has called up by his spells».

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Communist Manifesto, 1848

A verse of Goethe’s Faust serves as the title of this work, which is a personal interpretation to this quintessence character in German literature. By tragic means, Faust embraces scientific irresponsibility and indifference of life, perfectly complementing the constant grasping of a coal-mining machine. The human mind possessed a terrifying and beautiful power in Goethe’s times, expressing its own potential more insistently and urgently at just that moment.

An off-screen female narrator whispers some passages of this play, while the movement of the machine seems to return the earth back to its source, as the video plays backwards.

Conception, camera, editing and postproduction: Michelle-Marie Letelier
Voice: Regina Janssen
Sound arrangements: Scott Monteith

This artwork has been produced as a limited edition of 7 copies in a handmade box, including:

• One DVD-VIDEO, HD Video 1440 x 1080, 5 mins.
• One DVD-ROM, HD Video 1440 x 1080, 5 mins (Quicktime)
• A photograph of the video still, 23,5 x 13,5 cm
• A piece of coal belonging to the brown coal mining area where the video has been filmed

• Exhibited at: Perlini Arte Gallery, Padua, Italy; Cultural Centre of Spain, Santiago, Chile; K-Salon, Berlin, Germany; Gabriela Mistral Gallery, Santiago, Chile and X Video and Media Arts Biennial, Santiago, Chile