Labour in a Single Shot is a project by Antje Ehmann and Harun Farocki, in collaboration with Alice Creischer, Andreas Siekmann and thirty-six artists or collectives from six different cities, focused on labour. A coproduction by Maumaus and the Goethe-Institut Portugal, in the framework of the partnership with the Maumaus Residency Programme.

In the seminars that Antje Ehmann and Harun Farocki conducted in different world cities, the participants were invited to develop projects in video format and focused on labour, framed in a single shot and with limited duration. According to the concept of the authors, the exhibition now presented at Lumiar Cité results in an installation consisting of a selection of these projects, including the group of Lisbon, and pictograms designed by Alice Creischer and Andreas Siekmann. One element of the installation is dedicated to the film by the Lumière brothers ʻLa sortie des usines Lumièreʻ (1895), documenting a scene of workers leaving the workplace. This pioneering film frames a series of works that result from current readings of the documented situation.

The videos, with a maximum duration of two minutes (the reference film of the Lumière brothers lasts about a minute), depict work in six cities in Europe, Asia and America. The starting point of this exercise, in addition to the subject, was to elicit reflection on issues related to a filmed record of a repetitive process and how to find its beginning and end: Should the camera be in motion or at a fixed point? Is it possible to shoot the choreography of a work process in a stimulating way and in a “single shot”? What types of work are visible in the centre and on the outskirts of towns? What is typical and what is unusual in a city and what kind of work can become a cinematic challenge?

In the exhibition, the videos become a fragmented picture of each city, their juxtapositioning allowing comparisons to be drawn. Because they are all taken in a single shot, the videos combine predestination and openness, concept and contingency. From a reflection on the specificity of the medium, the works suggest spatiotemporal portraits and extended views on the phenomena of labour in an interconnected world.

Participants:
• Lisbon: Gabriel Barbi, Mariana Gonçalves, & Arendse Krabbe & Thea van der Maase, Sara Magno, James Newitt, Sofia Costa Pinto, Ana Rebordão, Rui Silveira
• Bangalore: Suresh Kumar Gopalreddy, Gautam Vishwanath & Kinshuk Surjan & Shrikar Marur, Nikhil Patil & Arav Narang, Verena Buttmann & Vijaya Kumar Seethappa, Nehar Shrestha, Pooja Gupta & Sindhu Thirumalaisamy
• Berlin: Renee Paulokat & Susanne Dzeik & Markus Bauer, Achim Burkart, Susanne Dzeik, Antje Freitag, Katja Henssler, Zara Zandie
• Geneva: Nina Kennel & Manon Vila & Thomas Amman, Mélanie Badout & Nallini Menamkat & Zaq Chojecki, Pauline Cazorla & Joseph Favre, Mykyta Kryvosheiev, Gerard Bochaton & Chloé Malcotti, Gabriel Dutrait & Hyunji Lee & Camille De Pietro
• Rio de Janeiro: Fred Benevides & Felipe Ribeiro & Luiz Garcia, Fred Benevides & Cezar Migliorin, Lucas Ferraço Nassif, Roberto Robalinho, Cristián Silva-Avária
• Tel Aviv: Inbal Hershtig, Hadas Emma Kedar, Efrat Merin, Tamar Nissim, Liron Shalev, Hadas Tapuchi

Antje Ehmann lives and works in Berlin as an author and curator. Her curatorial projects include: Harun Farocki. First Time in Warsaw, Centre for Contemporary Art, Ujadowski Castle, Warsaw 2012; The Image in Question. War – Media – Art, Carpenter Center for Visual Arts, Cambridge, Massachusetts 2010; and Harun Farocki. 22 films 1968–2009 (with Stuart Comer and Kodwo Eshun), Tate Modern, London 2009. Her publications and articles include: Harun Farocki. First Time in Warsaw (with Artur Liebhart), Warsaw 2012; Amos Gitai. News from Home (with Katharina Fichtner and Anselm Franke), Cologne 2006; and Geschichte des Dokumentarischen Films in Deutschland, Vol. 2, Weimarer Republik (with Jeanpaul Goergen and Klaus Kreimeier), Stuttgart 2005.

Harun Farocki lives and works in Berlin as a filmmaker, artist and writer. His essay and observation films question the production and perception of images, decoding film as a medium and examining how audiovisual culture is related to history, politics, technology and war. His projects have been shown in festivals and solo, group and retrospective exhibitions worldwide at important events and international institutions, including the 2010 São Paulo Biennial, Documenta X and XXII in Kassel, Tate Modern in London, MACBA in Barcelona, Museum Ludwig in Cologne and the Jeu de Paume in Paris.