Nuno Cera (PT/DE)
Unité d’Habitation, 2006
8:28
LOCATION: Unité d'habitation 1957-1958 (Corbusierhaus), Flatowallee 16, 14055 Berlin, Germany.
This short video is divided into three blocks:
1.Everything looks normal, natural and fine, a sort of documentary style of the architectural space.
2.Some strange and small signals of the “evil” disturb the normal surrounding (the subjective camera and the sound)
Important aspects are:
1.The building itself, the architectural space.
2.The fact that we don’t know and we don’t see what is happening and why it happens.
3.The sound is the layer that brings the dramatic atmosphere.
4.A murder happens in the Unité d’habitation.
Aesthetics:
The girl wears white and blue American Apparel,
70’s colour filters in some shots from the outside.
Light: Inside the flat: red and blue
A conceptual and abstract photography.
SCENE 1 – Location Sound + French Male Voice-over
EXT. UNITÉ D'HABITATION COMPLEX – LATE AFTERNOON
Picture: Different video stills of the surroundings and the exterior of the building - the facades, the parking lot, etc. Some voyeuristic views to the interior of some apartments, some movements inside. A blue light pulses from one of the flats. Some stills from an interior of a flat - windows, bath room, the kitchen etc…
SOUND – VOICE OVER
«Soyez les bienvenus à l’Unité d’Habitation de Berlin!
L’Unité d’Habitation de Berlin est placée à Charlottenburg et comporte 558 appartements selon la répartition suivante : 212 de une pièce, 253 de deux pièces en duplex, 88 de trois pièces en duplex, 4 de quatre pièces et 1 à cinq pièces également en duplex. Les appartements sont croisés par rues intérieures étagées qui ont un largueur de 2.96 mètres et une longueur de 140 mètres. Deux ascenseurs plus un monte charge desservent les différents niveaux.
L’Unité d’Habitation de Berlin à été achevé en 1958 selon le concept de l’architecte Le Corbusier pour un immeuble de logement. Le concept avait eu deux applications auparavant - Marseille en 1952, Rezé-lès-Nantes en 1955 - et deux autres ensuite - Briey en Forêt en 1959, Firminy en 1968. Toutes les mesures du bâtiment sont en accord avec le Modulor, un système de proportions développé d’après la Séction d’or et les séries de Fibonaci.
Le Modulor est représenté dans le béton creux des façades au niveau du sol sous la figure d’un homme de bras tendu. Cet homme vit dans la ville radieuse, en harmonie avec la nature et le cosmos. Il vous reçoit dans sa maison et dit: soyez les bienvenus à l’Unité d’Habitation de Berlin! »
SCENE 2 – Location, Sound + Steps
EXT. UNITÉ D'HABITATION COMPLEX – NIGHT
A girl walks into the Unité. The camera follows her with a soft pan and a wide shot. Cut to a medium back shot of the entrance of the building. The girl disappears inside the Unité.
SCENE 3 – Soundscape
INT. UNITÉ D'HABITATION COMPLEX – artificial light
Different empty corridors, a long and slow zoom in. The space is absolutely empty and strange.
SCENE 4 – Soundscape
Surveillance camera view (bluish and grainy picture) - the elevator arrives at the 6th floor and the girl walks out of the elevator (we never see her face). Cut to a surveillance camera into the corridor. The girl walks along the corridor. She drops her keys. She goes into her flat and the door closes. Empty space again. The same shot of the elevator, it goes down.
SCENE 5 – Location Sound + Steps + Classical Music / Aria
Subjective camera (steady cam) – the elevator arrives, getting in. Looking around. Getting out in the 3rd level. Searching, walking slowly into a different corridor. Imperceptible sounds of people talking inside a flat in German. Walking further, a different door, a different sound (TV, introduction of the film Shivers). Moving up through the stairs, keeping search. 6th floor. Increasingly strange sounds are coming from the different apartments (electronic music, different soundscapes..)
The camera arrives at the door of the girl. The door opens. We walk in…one, two, three steps inside the flat. Sound of water running from the bathroom and classical music.
Fade out
SCENE 6 – Classical Music / Aria
EXT. UNITÉ D'HABITATION COMPLEX – NIGHT
Wide-shot of the building. A red light is pulsing in one of the apartments ( note: should be at the same level as the girls apartment).
Slow zoom in as the red light increases the intensity at the same time the aria gets to the dramatic finale.
A long scream… in the quiet night.
Cut
SCENE 7 – Location Sound
INT. GIRL FLAT / BATHROOM – artificial reddish light
Close ups of skin. Slow pan, skin covered in blood. Different shots of the skin and the blood. Blood dripping on the floor. A small muscle spasm.
Fade out
SCENE 8 – EXT.Unite d’habitation.Location Sound
Fade in
Unité d’habitation at night. Credits over the picture.
Alternative End
SCENE 9 – EXT. Unite d’habitation. Location Sound
Unité d’habitation at night. Medium shot. Zoom in the apartment of the girl. She stand at the window.Was everything a dream ? or it really happen?
Credits over the picture.
Biography
Born in 1972 in Beja, Portugal, lives and works in Berlin and Lisbon. He graduated in advertising at IADE, Lisbon, in 1995, attended the Maumaus Photography workshop – School of art and photography, Lisbon between 1995 and 1997. He was assistant to Pedro Cabrita Reis between 1997 and 1999. He was granted a scholarship by the Pépinières Européennes pour Jeunes Artistes, the Orient Foundation and the CPF-Portuguese Photography Centre of the Ministry of Culture. In 2001, he was awarded by the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation João Hogan scholarship for resident artists to the Künstlerhaus Bethanien, in Berlin. In 2004, was nomineed to be in the short list of the first edition of Besphoto – Portuguese Photographic Award. In 2006 he made an artist residency at ISCP -International Studios and Curatorial Programme in New York. “Using film, photography and drawing, I create a viewing system that is the result of: visual and time experiences, landscapes, visions of places, light, motion, nature, small actions, non-spaces, beauty , horror, architecture, people, cities and searching.” (Nuno Cera) - www.nunocera.com
Selected exhibitions
LOST,LOST,LOST (Lisboa,2006)
The Prora Complex and other works (Berlin, 2005)
Cosmic (Berlin, 2005)
Dark Forces (Viseu, 2004)
DK (Berlin, 2003)
Berlin - a super-8 movie (New York, 2003)
Smog (Lisbon,2000)
Runaway World (Caldas da Rainha, 2000)
Snapshots (Coimbra, 1997)
Besphoto (Lisbon, 2005)
Metamorph.IX Biennale di Venezia de Architettura / Metaflux - Portuguese Pavillion (with Diogo Lopes) (2004,Venice)
Outras alternatives - Novas experiencias visuais em Portugal (Vigo, 2003)
Fair Play (Berlin, 2003)
7 Artistas ao 10º Mês (Lisbon, 2001)
Observatório (Madrid, 1998)