Friday, 13 March at 7 pm
Chantal Akerman: My Mother Laughs, Prelude
Exhibition opening
(2012, video installation, colour, sound, loop, 27'16'')
Sound: the voice of Chantal Akerman reading an excerpt from her book My Mother Laughs in English (Ma mère rit, originally published in French, Mercure de France, ‘Traits et portraits’ library, Paris, 2013.)
Director: Chantal Akerman
Image/sound editing and spatial design: Claire Atherton
With thanks to the Chantal Akerman Foundation and Marian Goodman Gallery.
My Mother Laughs is a performative reading session based on the book My Mother Laughs by filmmaker Chantal Akerman. The daughter of Polish Jews who survived Auschwitz and found refuge in Belgium, Akerman was always obsessed with the space of home and was always searching for a sense of “belonging” - even though she often stated she belonged nowhere. Her emotional cartography involved a tension between abstract evocation and the concrete elements of everyday life. Home, in turn, embodied the centrepiece of her practice – an ancient yet profoundly modern concept that in many of her films became the stage for the ultimate theatre of solitude.
Programme schedule:
7 pm Presentation of the video installation My Mother Laughs, a Prelude (Chantal Akerman, 2012, 27'16")
The Upper Floor Gallery, Preradovićeva 5
7:30 pm Book launch: My Mother Laughs (Chantal Akerman, Bijeli val, 2025, translated by Milena Ostojić)
8:30 pm Screening: No Home Movie (Chantal Akerman, 2015, 115')
The exhibition remains open until 27 March 2026.