HD film, 13:23 min Loop
2017
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The film “The Threshold” is based on material filmed during an ethnological expedition in the Western Province of Papua New Guinea. As a byproduct of the excursion, the attention wanders from the ethnological subject and is captured by the nocturnal activity of amphibians. The camera rests at the eye level of toads moving back and forth in front of a door at the jungle outpost of Balimo in Papua New Guinea. The film sequence is thereby crossed by axes of reflection, along which forward played episodes are reversed in order to be seamlessly repeated. The captured events seem to be trapped in a time warp and thus confined forever to the space on this side of the threshold. Just as in Franz Kafka’s parable “Before the Law” the threshold is never crossed. In this fabulous nocturnal sequence the toads can be understood as masks, which in turn are reflections of the realms of human society.
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