For Museum Night on November 2, MOOZ will present a short film program in the new spaces of the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. MOOZ is essentially a virtual space for artistic works featuring moving images from the Academy and, as an anagram of ZOOM, it focuses on experimental audiovisual formats. The program includes Mareike Wegener's first short film "Haarteile" (2005, 7min, 16mm, b/w).

Under the title talk talk, MOOZ will showcase artistic works for Museum Night that vary in approach—documentary, experimental, performative, or installation-based. Each piece communicates in a distinct, intense, and personal language, drawing attention to diverse forms of communication.

"Haarteile" was created in the seminar "Documentary Miniatures" under Dietrich Leder, with the assignment of documenting a repetitive action. During the seminar, Mareike Wegener watched "Oskar Langenfeld. 12 Mal" (1966) by Holger Meins, which had a profound impact on her both thematically and formally, influencing the fragmentary structure of "Haarteile". The film is an intergenerational study of hair rituals among women, where biographical patterns seem to repeat themselves. By observing three women of different ages engaging in their hair rituals, one discovers more commonalities than differences: young-middle-aged-elderly, morning-noon-evening, styling-dyeing-hairpieces.

During the summer break, the KINDL invites visitors to an open-air film programme exploring the topic of fragility both artistically and thematically. The curated selection, titled States of Fragility, features seven short films by contemporary international artists and directors. Our film RIAFN will screen alongside works by Factory of Found Clothes (FFC), Eva Giolo, Sky Hopinka, Yeo Siew Hua, Pauline Curnier Jardin, and Alice Rohrwacher & JR. These films explore themes of transformation and change, the natural cycle of life and death, and the rituals in between. They engage with myths, ancestors, and traditional beliefs, portraying a vulnerable world and the fragility of ecosystems. Some films reference actual events and build narratives around them, while others unfold through montages of images and the creation of atmospheres. The overarching theme of fragility and its far-reaching facets connects all the films.

Wednesday, August 21st, 8 pm at KINDL - Zentrum für zeitgenössische Kunst in Berlin. With an introduction by curator Katherina Perlongo. Free admission.

Mareike Wegener's film debut ECHO is currently streaming online at ARD Mediathek until June 3rd.

The film tells the story of the war-wounded chief inspector Harder (Valery Tscheplanowa), who survived a bomb attack as a police trainer in Afghanistan. Back in Germany, as a fresh start she is supposed to determine the identity of a bog body found in the moorland of a peaceful village. It's our first feature film production, co-produced with WDR. The production was supported by the Film- und Medienstiftung NRW, KJDF, BKM, and DFFF. After completion, the film premiered at the Berlinale 2022 and was distributed to cinemas by Grandfilm.

On the occasion of the TV premiere, Matthias Hannemann writes in the FAZ: 'With her debut, the author and director skillfully reminds us that while German society engages with guilt and crime through the pervasive presence of crime shows on television, it fails to delve deeply into the complexities of guilt. The omnipresent public memory stands in no relation to the silence that prevails when remembering becomes uncomfortable: at one's own doorstep, in one's own house."

At the end of the year, Hannes Lang began filming THE CLOUD FACTORY together with cinematographer Felix Rier. The short film is an experimental exploration of the Rhenish lignite mining region, which is currently home to 52 active power plant units and three of the ten highest-emission coal-fired power plants in Europe. However, the region is by no means a deserted, electricity-producing industrial area, but has been a densely populated habitat for centuries. At this location, THE CLOUD FACTORY takes the ephemeral phenomenon of the cloud as an opportunity to take a cinematic look at human hopes, castles in the air and visions of the future in the face of our present, which is strained by climate and energy crises.

THE CLOUD FACTORY is a PETROLIO production in co-production with ZDF / Arte and is being made there for the series "La Lucarne”. The production is supported by the Film- und Medienstiftung NRW, the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media (BKM), the IDM Südtirol and the Office for Film and Media of the Autonomous Province of Bolzano - South Tyrol.