Bani Abidi’s The Song screens in the Artists’ Film strand at Aesthetica Short Film Festival 2023.

The film will feature in the third strand of the artists' film programme, screening on the 9th, 11th and 12th November across different venues in York.

In The Song, an elderly man of middle Eastern appearance arrives at what seems to be his officially designated new abode. He sets down his solitary suitcase, opens a welcome pack of German food (which he will later replace with items he likes rather more) and unlocks the door to his balcony. Air and street noise come rushing in – as do recollections of equivalent moments in the world he has left behind. We watch as he plays with the lid of a whistling kettle, as if tuning this unfamiliar contraption, and look on as he experimentally opens and closes windows, adjusting the acoustics of airflow, as if pressing or releasing the valves of a building-sized musical instrument. Days pass, with repeated trips to the world outside, and repeated climbs back up the stairs to the apartment, with sundry purchases (an electric toothbrush, plastic bottles, a whisk) that he fashions into makeshift kinetic objects, whose low-key, repetitive sounds echo those from other rooms he has known (the whirr of an overhead fan, perhaps, or the hum of a generator). Symbols of comfort and consolation, this growing family of objects surround him like the resonant appendages of a one-man-band and cheerfully offer the back-up rhythm and accompaniment that allow him to give voice to his own unique, highly personal song.

The Song (2022) by Bani Abidi was commissioned by Film and Video Umbrella, Contemporary Art Society, John Hansard Gallery and Salzburger Kunstverein. Supported by Arts Council England. Presented by Contemporary Art Society to Gallery Oldham.