Constant
In collaboration with Beny Wagner / 40 min / 2022 / 2K DCP
"Constant" is a journey through the social and political histories of measurement. For most of recorded history, the human body was the measure of all things. “Constant” asks what led measurement to depart from the body and become a science unto itself. The film explores three shifts in the history of measurement standardization, from the land surveying that drove Early Modern European land privatization, to the French Revolution that drove the Metric Revolution, to the conceptual dematerialisation of measurement in the contemporary era of Big Science. Each chapter traces the relationship of measurement standardization to ideas of egalitarianism, agency, justice, and power. Cinematic and technical images that begin as products of measurement systems are stretched beyond their functions to describe the resistance of lived experience to symbolic abstractions.
Credits
Text / direction / edit / sound design: Sasha Litvintseva and Beny Wagner
Produced by: Guillaume Cailleau for CaSk Films, Sasha Litvintseva and Beny Wagner
3D and point cloud animation: Matteo Mastrandrea
Camera: Sasha Litvintseva
Original music: dead hand / Additional music: Beny Wagner
Narration: Cynthia Beatt
Supported by: Medienboard Berlin Brandenburg; Beauftragter der Bundesregierung für Kultur und Medien
Jury statement - Silvestre Award for Short Film, Indie Lisboa: "We were impressed with Sasha and Beny’s deft handling of what could be considered forebodingly complex subject matter, particularly their ability to explain and engage at the same time. Their use of formally innovative techniques made for a distinct visual experience that had a real impact on us all, and also (perhaps more importantly) on the audience in attendance. A singular meditation on measurement, state power and opaque systems of informations."
Jury statement - Best International Short Documentary, Guanajuato Film Festival: "Constant offers a highly critical reflection on power, based on an unsuspected revision presented with both cinematic rigor and experimentation.”
Awards
Silvestre Award for Best Short Film, Indie Lisboa Film Festival, 2022
Best International Short Documentary, Guanajuato Film Festival, 2022
Main Award, Olomouc Festival of Science Documentary Film, 2022
Jury Special Mention, EXiS Seoul, 2022
Exhibition list
International Film Festival Rotterdam - Ammodo Tiger Shorts Competition, The Netherlands 2022
CPH:DOX, NEW:VISION competition, Denmark, 2022
Courtisane Film Festival, Ghent, Belgium, 2022
Transmediale, Berlin, Germany, 2022
Indie Lisboa Film Festival, Lisbon, Portugal, 2022
Open City Documentary Festival, London, UK, 2022
First Look, Museum of the Moving Image, New York, 2022
Prismatic Ground, Maysles Documentary Center, New York, 2022
Ohlar de Cinema, Curitiba, Brazil, 2022
Guanajuato International Film Festival, Mexico, 2022
EXiS Seoul, South Korea, 2022
Curtocircuito film festival, Spain, 2022
IMPAKT festival, Utrecht, The Netherlands, 2022
Wexner Center for the Arts, USA, 2022
e-flux screening room, NYC, USA, 2022
Asia Cultural Center cinemateque, Seoul, South Korea, 2022
MUTA International Film Festival, Lima, Peru, 2022
Chicago Underground Film Festival, USA, 2022
Camden International Film Festival, USA, 2022
Imagine Science Film Festival, USA, 2022
FRONTDOC, Italy, 2022
Kurzfilmfestival Koln, Germany, 2022
Bangkok World Film Festival, Thailand, 2022
Hugh Lane Gallery, Dublin, Ireland, 2023
InScience Film Festival, The Netherlands, 2023
Ginzaza, Tokyo, Japan, 2023
The Measure of the World, Radius CCA, The Netherlands, 2023
Chemist Gallery, London, 2023
Festival of Science Documentary Film, Olomouc, Czech Republic, 2023
2 Annas Film Festival, Riga, Latvia, 2023
Hugh Lane Gallery, Dublin, Ireland, 2023
Seoul Mediacity Biennale, South Korea, 2023
Taiwan Video Art Biennale, Taipei, Taiwan, 2023
Press
Interview in Senses of Cinema
Interview in Filmmaker Magazine
Related:
Monsters, Measures and Metabolisms
As installed as an immersive sculptural and light installation at Seoul Mediacity Biennale, scenography by Matteo Mastrandrea and Isabel Ogden, Seoul, South Korea, 2023
