Rhoda Davids Abel

In a constantly growing edition of small volumes, the French writer Annie Ernaux is exploring the biographical as the universal. To this day she envelops her own experience of a rugged reality of life with laconic insistence, and her language – coming from afar – casts a dissecting gaze on it. Devoid of any sentimentality, this language manages to transcend the seemingly private into something personal and to shelter it from a psychological point of view. The language finds its expression in a meandering narrative and reaches a poignant clarity before any background knowledge could lead to allegations by means of rational argument.
The video ARA ARA plays roughly six minutes and is without audio. Two streams of words complement the images. On the one hand, the appellative character of the title finds its continuation in white script. It is always placed in the center of the moving image. On the other hand, there is a song line in yellow script to be found in the lower part of the screen. These poetic strings of words appear softly and know many voices and points of view. A comprehensive alertness transcends a rich experience which is all but loudly advertised. Only after rewatching and rereading does the spectator become aware of quick painful flashes resulting from the ambiguity of those different points of view.
Backgrounds of dark ultramarine and magenta with a purple hue creat a space for the profile of a head and a hand to appear. The hand hes- itantly reaches for black leaves and caresses them with an almost anxious tenderness before the short introduction dissolves into an astral vastness created by NASA footage and material from other sources. The song line never contradicts the unconditional beauty of space, but the amazement is soon joined by a growing anxiousness nourished by the gap between creaturely and spiritual aspects of existence.
A space shuttle flops on its belly like a big and vulnerable animal, obtains gravity in a place that does not know gravitation. This goes to show how meticulous Rhoda Davids Abel sifts through the footage and choses images that seem to be infused with her very own experience.
A gentle floating return to earthly gravity in a sky of endless blue constitutes the end of the video. As conciliatory as this closing may seem, as deceptive it is. ARA ARA oscillates between the stellar constellation, spiritual instance and the sound of a voice without a body. With great cer- tainty it finds itself in the between. A premonition of space being mirrored in one’s own dramas finds a convincing form.
Text by: Anselm Stalder