Ode, 1992, Video

Ode is a video piece first screened on Icelandic state TV. in January 1992.
It is a homage to Iceland and its nature.

The mental world revealed by Finnbogi Petursson’s Hymn (1992) is constituted by the imprecise, fragmentary almost obsessional reality of memory “When I was living in Holland and spending my summers in Iceland, I felt I wanted to work with Icelandic nature. But when I came face to face with it, it swallowed me up body and soul. On my return to Holland, the images of the landscape were still very strong but gradually they got weaker” In his minimalist video, the traces kept by failing memory are no more than a few bursts of image and sound referring to the four elements (earth, water, air, fire): they take us to the heart of matter. This essentially musical composition follows a principle of repetition and reversal: a first movement obtained by the progressive addition of units is followed by a second, decreasing one, using a staccato rhythm that gives the spectator no rest.

Gunnar Kvaran