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Quantum Creole

Forum Expanded Exhibition 2020
© Filipa César/Spectre Productions/Volte Films
In the beginning was the weave, and the transmission of its workings, a curse of mortality – so ends Quantum Creole with the fabulous words of the Papel weaver, Zé Interpretador.
The punch-card technology, designed for the textile loom, was fundamental for the development of the computer – the binary code is thus closer to the ancient act of weaving than to that of writing. Quantum Creole is an experimental documentary film collectively researching creolization and addressing its historical, ontological, and cultural forces. Referring to the minimum physical entity in any interaction – quantum – the film utilizes different imaging forms to read the subversive potential of weaving as Creole code. West African Creole people wove coded messages of social and political resistance into textiles, countering the colonists’ languages and technologies. As the new face of colonization manifests itself as a digital image, upgrading terra nullius in the form of an ultra-liberal free trade zone in the Bissagos Islands, it also marks the continuation of the violence that erupted several centuries ago with the creation of slave-trading posts in the place then known as the Rivers of Guinea and Cape Verde.
by Filipa César
with Zé Interpretador, Odete da Costa Semedo, Olivier Marboeuf, Marinho de Pina, Wendy Hui Kyong Chun, Joana Barrios, Mark Waschke, Nelly Yaa Pinkrah, Diana McCarty, Saliha Podingo von Medem Germany / France / Portugal / Spain 2016 Guinea-Bissau Creole, Portuguese, German, English, French 40’ Colour Documentary form

With

  • Zé Interpretador
  • Odete da Costa Semedo
  • Olivier Marboeuf
  • Marinho de Pina
  • Wendy Hui Kyong Chun
  • Joana Barrios
  • Mark Waschke
  • Nelly Yaa Pinkrah
  • Diana McCarty
  • Saliha Podingo von Medem

Crew

Director Filipa César
Screenplay Diana McCarty
Cinematography Matthias Biber, Filipa César, Jenny Lou Ziegel
Editing Filipa César
Sound Design Jin Mustafa
Sound Gabor Ripli
Production Design Filipa César
Assistant Director Alima de Graf
Production Manager Michel Balagué
Producers Olivier Marboeuf, Filipa César, Michel Balagué
Executive Producer Olivier Marboeuf

Produced by

Filipa César

Spectre Productions

http://www.spectre-productions.com http://www.spectre-productions.com

Volte

Filipa César

© Dario Lehner

Born in Porto, Portugal in 1975. She studied painting at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Porto and at the Faculdade de Belas Artes of the University of Lisbon. In 2008, she completed an MA in art in context at Berlin University of the Arts. Since 2011, she has been researching the origins of the cinema of the African Liberation Movement in Guinea-Bissau as a laboratory of decolonising epistemologies. She premiered her first feature-length film Spell Reel at the Forum in 2017, while Quantum Creole was exhibited at Forum Expanded in 2020. She lives and works in Berlin.

Filmography

2007 Rapport; 16 min. · Allee der Kosmonauten; 8 min. 2008 Le passeur; 34 min. 2009 The Four Chambered Heart; 29 min. 2010 Insert; 10 min. · Memograma; 40 min. · Porto, 1975; 10 min. 2011 The Embassy; 7 min. 2012 Cuba; 10 min., Forum Expanded 2013 · Cacheu; 10 min. 2013 Conakry; 10 min. 2014 Mined Soil; 32 min. 2015 Transmission from the Liberated Zones; 30 min., Forum Expanded 2016 2017 Spell Reel; 96 min., Forum 2017 2018 Sunstone; short documentary 2020 Quantum Creole; short documentary 2024 Resonance Spiral; documentary

Bio- & filmography as of Berlinale 2024