Christian Barani

In Djibouti's Rift Valley, amid the darkness of volcanic rocks, men wait. In this desert, a few years ago, salt production organized life. Since then, competition has won out. On the shores of Lake Assal, a few holdouts search for salt concretions, hoping to sell them to the few tourists who come to admire the blue of the lake.

This film is a look at the disappearance of religious and industrial cultures in a small town (Scardovari) located in northern Italy (Po Delta). This erasure, together with the economic situation, pushes the men and women to return to the water to survive. The image as a representation of the memory of a place, of an inner landscape, of a mystery. A narrative that belongs to the world of exegesis, to an infinite world of relationships, of networks where each image enters into correspondence with another, opening up the meaning ever more and breaking the unity of history.

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I recorded a single take on Video8. This resulted in the film Staber Mater, a tribute to Fra Angelico, the Italian Quattrocento painter. This tension of the single gesture excites me enormously and forces me to confront my responsibilities.

The "Angels of Mons" have been the subject of many literary and artistic adaptations. Here is a new cinematographic interpretation of this legend.