Strategy, Design, Photography, Multimedia
video
loud / quiet / rantepao
A day in the life in the town of Rantepao, located in the Tana Toraja region of Sulawesi, Indonesia. August 2011.
for just one euro
On September 24 and 25, 2011, Pope Benedict XVI came to the city of Freiburg, Germany, population 220,000. That weekend, over 100,000 pilgrims arrived to pay him a visit. Total costs to the city and its citizens, both Catholic and non-Catholic, topped 25+ million euros, with the city of Freiburg donating 11 million from its budget and the Catholic church contributing an additional 14+ million. The video below, filmed on September 24th near Freiburg’s Rathaus (City Hall), focuses its attention away from the direct path of the Pope, toward his visitors, to explore symbols valued, vested meanings and commodification of religious icons. In particular, it chronicles the efforts of a local kindergarten to raise funds by offering pilgrims the chance to have their photos taken beside a life-sized, color cardboard image of the Pope.
your portrait on a communion wafer
In September 2011, in honor of Pope Benedict XVI’s visit to Freiburg, Germany, political artist Jan Sosein Carl seized the opportunity to add his own distinctive voice to the public discourse, creatively challenging the day’s visitors to think more critically about separation of church and state. Also known as the Bundeskünstler, (a pun on the German word “Bundeskanzler”, or “federal chancellor”), Jan Sosein Carl located a spot on Freiburg’s City Hall plaza, then sat on the ground with a simple sign and a few pens. To those who passed by, he offered to sketch small, line-drawn caricatures onto common baking wafers — ones that most, at a quick glance, might identify as communion wafers. However, his particular wafers were clearly store-bought (as evidenced by their packaging) and had not been blessed by a priest, a fact which formally precluded their possession of religious significance, at least in the official sense. As onlookers curiously inquired and made requests for the free drawings, the artist engaged them in conversation, both serious and humorous, and subtly encouraged a challenging of cultural and political norms. In this way, the artist’s performance highlighted the tensions involved in distinguishing sacred object from common artifact — tacitly questioning the legitimacy of what may be considered “reverent” versus “irreverent”. This video follows the artist and his performance on that day, September 24, 2011, and attempts to capture the flavor of this cultural moment.
