Le Corbusier [|||||] Asger Jorn [Relief]

Le Corbusier [|||||] Asger Jorn [Relief]

Film by Heinz Emigholz

The film contrasts the "Villa Savoye", built by Le Corbusier in 1931, and Asger Jorn’s "Grand Relief", built in 1959.

Le Corbusier [IIIII] Asger Jorn [Relief] contrasts the Villa Savoye, built by Le Corbusier in 1931, and Asger Jorn’s Grand Relief, which the Danish painter and sculptor produced in 1959 for the Århus Statsgymnasium. The film makes connections between what does not belong together, at least not according to the ideological stipulations of their creators.

“The film came about because I was intrigued by the premise of comparing two buildings that at first seem to have nothing to do with one another. A dialogue between thoroughly stylized clarity and declared wildness, both with ideologically trimmings. It was only by working on the film that I learned to appreciate the two works that had once left me indifferent: the delight of their creators in the productively implemented statement.” Heinz Emigholz

Stills from Le Corbusier [|||||] Asger Jorn [Relief]:

Credits

Deutschland/Dänemark, 2015, HDV, 16:9, 29 Minuten
Buch, Regie, Kamera, Schnitt: Heinz Emigholz
Kamera, Schnitt, Ton, Postproduktion: Till Beckmann
Tongestaltung, Mischung: Jochen Jezussek, Christian Obermaier

Gefördert von Museum Jorn Silkeborg und Realdania
Produzent: Heinz Emigholz Filmproduktion

Thanks to Aarhus Arkitektskole, Aarhus Statsgymnasium, ADAGP, Ruth Baumeister, Centre des Monuments Nationaux (CMN), Thomas Emery, Karen Friis Herbsleb, Donation Jorn Silkeborg, Fondation Le Corbusier, Dorte Fristrup und Pierre Jeanneret

Websites: www.museumjorn.dk / www.pym.de

Copyright 2015 by Museum Jorn Silkeborg and Heinz Emigholz Filmproduktion

Excerpt from an interview with Zohar Rubinstein under the Streetscapes dialogue on May 7, 2015 Tel Aviv:

Zohar Rubinstein: How was working at the Le Corbusier villa?

Heinz Emigholz: What I felt, when I was there, was the history of the family Savoye. When you are there you have a phantasy about this family, and then how the Nazis took over and the Allies, and it was ruined. They only had ten years in the building. There was this sad aspect about the whole place, that in a way it’s an utopian setting. I don’t care much about Le Corbusier’s phrase „a house is a machine for living“. It’s a very well designed and personal place, but you got a feeling of sadness through the fact that it was so perfect and then it had to be left behind. The ghosts inhabiting this house made you feel uncomfortable when you were there... When we travelled to France, we arrived on a Sunday and our shooting day was a Monday. We arrived in the afternoon and, of course, we went to the location to look how the light would be in the afternoon. It was open to the public because it’s a national monument. There was a kind of performance going on. A modern dancer and a Jazz musician with a saxophon. They went through all the rooms of the house and then around the house. I said to my colleague Till Beckmann, It’s so strange that these modern houses always attract the same kind of performances... (Laughter)... as if they belong to them. Why is that?

R: A question about the meeting between culture and psychology, right?

E: In her dance movements was a lot of alienation, standing with her face to the wall, and the noise was squeaking as if it’s a big ordeal to live in that house or something... Maybe that’s already too much interpretation.

R: Because you knew already the history of the villa, you couldn’t help feeling that and you couldn’t help watching or sensing the ghosts. But suppose a person visits there as a guest and is not aware and therefore cannot see or feel the ghosts.

E: But as soon as you know, there is no way out. I filmed a lot of houses and sometimes you have the phantasy, How would it be, if I live here? It’s very nice for me to have so many locations in my brain, so that I can envision myself in all these houses. Because after you filmed them, they are burnt into your mind. With most of the houses I have the feeling, now it’s done and I don’t have to come back again. But then there are some houses where I think I want to go back.

R: So it’s true that in a way some of the buildings conway sadness rather than joy.

E: Yes. Very different feelings. The method of the films enables the sense of a building to come through, without being dramatized. You let it happen. The Loos-film, for example, has for me that aspect of European architecture at the end of something. It makes you very sad, when you know about his life and then you know about the Nazis and Austria. He died shortly before, but the whole idea of this architecture came to an end there. The sadness of the Villa Savoye was more on my side. It will not be in the film. I don’t say, Now I want to do a shot that makes you feel sad or something like that. I don’t do that.