Chantal?

Sonia Wieder-Atherton

With

  • Sonia Wieder-Atherton (CELLO)
  • & Stanislas Merhar (VOICE)

“This is a dialogue with Chantal. Chantal in “Blow up my city”. Chantal’s voice reading her book. I wanted to play along with her, her every move, her silences, at once burlesque and deadly serious dancing, her anxiety, humming little tunes. Tracking her, surprising her, surprising myself at each step. It’s an installation. In Chantal’s world. The images mingled with the words, and the words with the notes. ”

Sonia Wieder-Atherton.

«And then I can still see a big almost empty apartment in Brussels. With only a woman in it, often in her robe. A woman who has just lost her husband.
It’s funny but I don’t picture this woman outside although she does sometimes go out. She walks down the street. She waits for the tramway.

I especially see her on the telephone and lying down on her sofa in front of her television, sometimes with a newspaper in front of her. When she’s on the phone, she speaks too loud and with a liveliness that seems a little forced sometimes but not always.»

— Extract from “A Family in Brussels”, Chantal Akerman / 1998

Musiques : Sonate, Presto / Melodia, Béla Bartók ; Leoš Janáček, Poème morave, arrangement de Sonia Wieder-Atherton ; New York Quatuor, Sonia Wieder-Atherton ; Prière juive (traditionnelle) arrangement de Sonia Wieder-Atherton ; Cadence extraite de La Symphonie concertante, Op.125, Sergueï Prokofiev.

Film : Blow up my city, Chantal Akerman, 1968

Texte : Chantal Akerman, A Family in Brussels, 1998
A Family in Brussels is published and représented by L’Arche editeur.

With the support of Fondation Chantal Akerman

Production Walterfilms

photos ©RBG