Marc Neys (Belgium) – 35°30″ 35′ N, 12° 36″ 0′ E, 2014, 03:48
Poem: Die liebe in den Zeiten der EU (Love in the age of the EU)
Words & voice: Bjorn Kuhligk
Concept, camera, editing & music: Swoon
“We, Europeans have tendency to cut ourselves off from the rest of the world, the EU is almost like a green island in the ocean of poverty. Sometimes our prosperity makes us blind even though we’re going through financial crisis, economy is only a part of the problem. The biggest challenge for the EU is to face the crisis of values, the same values which founded EU such as: “..respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law and respect for human rights, including the rights of persons belonging to minorities … “. This short videopoem’s trying to visualize the ease used by moneymaking thughs to lure people in undertaking the dangerous journey. Yet ’ their boats are made of money’ , often European money.”
Marc Neys (aka Swoon)
By applying a poetic and often metaphorical language, Neys (aka Swoon) created several practically identical works, upon which thoughts that have apparently just been developed are manifested: notes are made and then crossed out again, ‘mistakes’ are repeated.
Shapes are dissociated from their original meaning, layers of meanings are being build upon endlessly. By manipulating the listener/viewer to create confusion, he tries to create works in which atmospheric moments of evocation and suspense are not part of a narrative thread. The drama unfolds elsewhere while the build-up of tension is frozen or repeats itself.
His works appear as dreamlike images in which fiction and reality meet, well-known tropes merge, meanings shift, past and present fuse. Time and memory always play a key role. By putting the viewer on the wrong track, he wants to amplify the alienation of the spectator. Creating compositions and settings that generate tranquil poetic images that leave traces and balances on the edge of recognition.
His works are on the one hand touchingly beautiful, on the other hand painfully dark. Again and again, the artist leaves us orphaned with a mix of conflicting feelings and thoughts. Marc Neys (aka Swoon) currently lives and works in Mechelen.