ALTHEA THAUBERGER: "Preuzmimo Benčić," Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal, Oct. 22, 2014 to Feb. 5, 2015

Althea Thauberger, Preuzmimo Benčić, Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal,

Oct. 22, 2014 to Feb. 5, 2015

By Paul Gessell

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Courtesy of the artist, Musagetes, and Susan Hobbs Gallery, Toronto. Photo: Milica Czerny Urban.

"Preuzmimo Benčić"

Althea Thauberger, "Preuzmimo Benčić," 2014, digital film, 57:14 min.

A massive industrial building known as Rikard Benčić was built in 1793 in the Croatian port city of Rijeka. Over the centuries the building served many functions, producing sugar, cigarettes, machine parts and other goods. It was abandoned in the 1990s, its workers dismissed, and it has been a political football since.

Enter Vancouver artist Althea Thauberger. For two months, Thauberger, a film crew and 67 Rijeka children, aged six to 13, occupied the factory with the blessing of local authorities. In largely ad-libbed performances, the children assumed the roles of both municipal officials and former factory workers, heatedly debating possible futures for the building.

The resulting 57-minute digital film, whose title translates as Take Back Benčić, is the latest collaborative effort between Thauberger and actors, either professional or amateur, to plumb particular social issues. Earlier films made in Germany, Italy and the Czech Republic explored attitudes towards mental illness, the fragility of minority languages and citizens’ civic duties. In Preuzmimo Benčić, we are asked who should decide the fate of a building that has been an integral part of a community for more than two centuries: Industrialists, government, the factory’s former workers or all citizens.

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Courtesy of the artist, Musagetes, and Susan Hobbs Gallery, Toronto. Photo: Milica Czerny Urban.

"Preuzmimo Benčić"

Althea Thauberger, "Preuzmimo Benčić," 2014, digital film, 57:14 min.

Watching the children passionately debate this question is thought provoking and sometimes humorous. They pantomime the repetitive movements of factory workers. They write poems and make drawings about possible futures for the building.

The film portrays the Rijeka children as feeling a strong bond to the structure. “We have given it life,” says one girl portraying a former factory employee. Do the children really feel this bond or are they parroting the dinner-table conversations of their parents? Whatever the case, they declare the building part of their heritage and part of their future, whether that future means an art gallery, as the city wants, or, as one boy gleefully suggests, an airport offering free plane rides to all citizens.

Viewers of Preuzmimo Benčić, as with other Thauberger films, are given only minimal background information about what’s happening on the screen. This can mean moments of frustration and bewilderment. Nevertheless, the trip is profound and should encourage viewers to “take back” the disintegrating landmarks of their own hometowns.

Preuzmimo Benčić has been having a long run as part of the Montreal Biennial and is also showing at the Susan Hobbs Gallery, Thauberger’s Toronto dealer. The film, with English subtitles, will be shown Jan. 29 in Vancouver at the Djavad Mowafaghian Cinema at Simon Fraser University’s Goldcorp Centre for the Arts.