original title:
Welcome Palermo
directed by:
cast:
Franco Alaimo, Vittoria Alliata, Salvo Cuccia, Suor Cornelia, Gambino di Bagheria “Elvis Dean”, Maziar Firouzi, Serena Ganci, Ramon Moro, Yuki O’, Leoluca Orlando, Giancarlo Parisi, Nicolò Scalzo, Gioacchino Lanza Tomasi, Eleonora Tomasino, Alberto Turra
screenplay:
cinematography:
editing:
music:
Davide Tomat, G.U.P. Alcaro
producer:
production:
country:
Italy
year:
2019
film run:
64'
format:
colour
status:
Ready (28/11/2019)
festivals & awards:
MASBEDO will present the world premiere of
Welcome Palermo on the occasion of Lo Schermo
dell’Arte Film Festival, Florence. The feature film
spans the formal and narrative development of the
Videomobile project, the coherent multi-channel
video installation conceived for Manifesta 12
Palermo.
Welcome Palermo takes its title from a random
street mural that greets anyone who arrives in
the city from the airport. It embodies a dystopian
welcome message that sets the city itself as the
protagonist, and not just as a simple landscape.
The journey of the Videomobile is the core of the
80-minute feature film. The artist duo transformed
an old OM van of the 1970s into a “video wagon”
as a experimentation to patrol and investigate the
Sicilian territory and its artist’s cinema.
Thanks to a particular suggestion by the curatorial
team of Manifesta 12, the research began in
2018 and attributed the involvement of several
leading figures in the iconic cinema scene, such
as Vittorio De Seta, Ugo Gregoretti, Luchino
Visconti, whilst investigating other professionals
that worked in cinema in an almost anonymous
and unconventional manner.
Welcome Palermo is not only a collective research
of materials for the project of Manifesta 12, but an
extensive buildout of the research process carried
out continually by the artists after the biennial.
The “video wagon” has altered the stage for
new performances, interactions and interviews,
bringing in personages such as the mayor of
Palermo Leoluca Orlando, Princess Vittoria
Alliata of Villafranca and Valguarnera, and the
Tamil community residing in the city.
The Videomobile of MASBEDO completes a
physical journey through the archives and memory
of the Sicilian experimental cinema and becomes
the means by which memory acquires form and
meaning in contemporary society.