THE BANQUET

2019 / 3 min

Still from The Banquet.

A convivial image immortalizes veterans from the fascist militia as they celebrate their victorious return from the colonial campaign in Ethiopia. The reaches of the frame however span beyond the limits of the photograph, weaving together the manifold threads of history.



The banquet hall is a spatial metaphor for history’s workings, for the illusion of linearity and progress as was extensively exploited by the fascist propaganda;  but it is also something else, and its meaning coincides with the surface of the photograph itself. Rather than moving forward towards their destiny as promised, the young men portrayed were trapped: in a way they remained bound for life to the surface of the banquet photo.


The reconstructed banquet hall as it appears in the video (top) and 3D software (bottom).
A significant degree of research went into locating the original hall and reconstructing it with historical accuracy.

With its tight format and short duration, The Banquet is constructed as a hybrid of  film essay and visual poem, one which however made use of a wide array of technologies, from geographical mapping through online tools to 3D modeling and rendering, for its making.

The work is a prologue to the The Silent Ray.


Winner of Jury Prize at EYE Filmmuseum’s Research Labs 2019.



© 2019 Rossella Nisio || Manic Owl Works