A DROWNFUL BRILLIANCE OF WINGS

For years I was told he was long dead / Then one day I found my father’s stamp collection. 

- Gillian Sze, Peeling Rambutan

In this collaboration between filmmaker Sofia Bohdanowicz and the poet Gillian Sze, memory is tied to the senses: the objects of those who are gone but can still be touched, the sound of places they have visited but can’t be properly pronounced, the taste of a dish they used to eat, the color of a world once shared, all exposed by light. The poet explores the quality of words and the filmmaker experiments with ways of capturing sound and image. Together they document the experience, both in the abstract and the concrete. The abstract is a sense of time and space, the concrete is Sze’s relationship with her father and grandfather through a series of habits: collecting stamps, taking care of plants, and making wonton soup. A quote by Robert Beavers’ From the Notebook of… finds its way into the fibers of this film, defining its mechanics: The shutter in the camera is like the wings of an insect, both create movement / one in space and the other in the eye.

Written by Lucía Salas

Available to watch on The Criterion Channel.