by Nelson Bourrec Carter, France, USA 2018, 13'
Presented at Lo schermo dell'arte 2021 in occasion of the exhibition Thinking Beyond – Moving Images for a Post-Pandemic WorldThe film is part of VISIO – European Programme on Artists’ Moving Images - 10th edition
Levittown is the first American suburbia. It was created after World War II as an embodiment of the American Way of Life, to be sold domestically and abroad. But it quickly became a segregated community, as its founders decided not to sell houses to people of colour. In the film, a latino man walks through this residential neighbourhood while enacting a monologue composed of familiar lines taken from famous suburban centric movies. As the sun sets, a young woman in a nearby house is confronted with an invisible threat that seems capable of disrupting the apparent tranquillity of her reality. Levittown reflects on the failures of a model of society that bases its well-being and security on exclusion and separation.
Nelson Bourrec Carter (1988, USA/France. Lives and works in Paris) is a French-American filmmaker and visual artist. His practice combines photography, film, installation and performance while his research revolves around the links woven between real territories and fantasized landscapes, influenced by the weight of popular imagery. His work focuses mainly on the influence of American iconography on identity construction and racial awareness, and operates from places whose hybridity, history or architecture lend themselves to a new interpretation. His films have been shown in festivals such as New Directors/New Films, Entrevues Belfort, Vila do Conde, in historic institutions like the Cinémathèque Française, but also in museums such as MoMA in New York or the Musée d’Art Contemporain du Val-de-Marne.
nelsonbcarter.com