Friedl vom Gröller

What goes missing in a time when mouths are covered by masks? At the beginning you see a set of replacement teeth. This still life opens the film, which bears the ominous year 2020 as its title. Even the very first image speaks volumes: a taboo object, almost surrealistic in its loneliness, stands naked in front of us. Only in the following shot is it contextualized. The dreaded set of dental instruments keeps the dentures company. Another shot shows the filmmaker herself who, as a patient, is feeling the agony caused by the tools. Her eyes see only the glare of the dentist’s lamp. Then, in place of her gaping toothless oral cavity, there appears the radiant image of a face adorned with teeth – followed by a nightmarish panning shot, where we see the dentist with his mask-covered mouth.

The setting of the film was simple and straightforward: the now 77-year-old Friedl vom Gröller asks a (homosexual) escort to do a nude film session, has the man’s fine rib underpants pulled down by her younger accomplice, filmmaker Josephine Ahnelt – who, like a puppeteer, remains hidden behind a wooden wall – and exposes his member. (Dietmar Schwärzler)

A young woman's body becomes the medium for the viewer’s projections of the stories and biographies that are imagined about her.

An elusive 16mm miniature from the legendary Friedl vom Gröller, Conditio Humana intersperses footage of the crumbling sandstone façade of Pavia’s Basilica di San Michele Maggiore with the returned stares of three performers.

An experimental film.

An ongoing portrait of Max Turnheim that begun in 2002 when he was 20 years old.

Friedl vom Gröller doesn’t give Christiana Perschon an interview. She gives her more: the film of a brief encounter, which in its ephemeral playfulness, precisely captures the artistic program of those portrayed. An intergenerational dialogue as affectionate togetherness.

Winter in Paris begins with a still-life of a window sill and beautifully detours to a gruesome-erotic allegory of death.

Like a dark screen stencil, a young woman dances in front of an open window. Although the film is silent, the rhythm of the music to which she dances can be imagined through her movements, often ecstatic.

A pan along a gallery of large washing machines in a laundromat. Two women speak sign language and a third feeds coins into the machine. Language is made visible. Language is a craft and serves to interpret what is and what might perhaps be. A silent film from a mythical universe, a realm of women who ask questions and patiently and ironically question everything.

A young woman sits on a bench in a baroque park. The motion of the wind in the leaves, in her hair, and also the flutter of her eyelashes, the opening of her lips, her imperceptible smile are all made visible with the absolutely static camera. A large baroque birdcage symbolizes a hopeless emotional situation. (Friedl vom Gröller)

A young man spitting cherry pits, with an off-screen accomplice, attempts to hit the camera´s lens with one of them. Various moods become apparent on the way to a certain goal: effort, failure, then finally success. A happy, lighthearted film.

No description available.

A film like a punch in the stomach. Blind photographer Evgen Bavčar examines the bodies of four women. The women's expressions and gestures speak volumes.

A silent, black and white film portrait of two children set against the eponymous Swiss river, Ticino takes its cue from Franz West's famous "Adaptives" sculptures.

Portraits and fragmented views of Paris intertwine.

No description available.

The theme of this short film is the relationship between psychoanalyst and client. Vom Gröll plays the analyst, a role she knows from real life. The setting is the studio she uses for the Escuela de Cine Independencia (Independent Film School), which she simply converts into a psychoanalytic office.

The title appears in thick boldface print. A short sequence of documentary snapshots, filmed off found paintings. These images pick up on figures from everyday life and religious practice, and according to the signature, were painted on public walls by a certain “Papisto Boy”. Two men are seen standing in front of an old whitewashed industrial building, smoking and talking. They turn toward the camera with their arms around each other, to pose for a portrait – the camera remains distanced. A tilt guides our gaze up to the underside of the tin roof where metal has been eaten away by rust. Off-screen the sound of drums is heard.

A cheerful ritual in praise of Mami Wata, a mermaid-like water spirit of life, sex and healing. A joyful show of Friedl vom Gröller's particular sense of humour as well as another short song of praise for the unique beauty to be found only in 16mm film.