¡Bienvenido Mr Wong!
(Welcome Mr Wong!)
|
|
2 channel looped digital video
1min50s; 4min16s
2007
Inspired by the Spanish film Welcome Mr. Marshall!, or ¡Bienvenido, Mr. Marshall! - a 1953 comedy Spanish film directed by Luis García Berlanga and considered one of the masterpieces of Spanish cinema. It tells the story of a small Spanish town, Villar del Río, which hears of the visit of American diplomats and begins preparations to impress the American visitors in the hopes of benefitting under the Marshall Plan.
A central theme of the film is the stereotypes held by both the Spanish and the Americans regarding the culture of the other. Hoping to demonstrate the side of Spanish culture with which the visiting American officials will be most accustomed, the citizens of the castillian Villar del Río don unfamiliar Andalusian costumes, hire a renowned flamenco performer, and redecorate their town in Andalusian style.
In this work, Ming reinterprets a speech given to the town to boost their morale and encourage them to undergo the cultural transformation.
Ming had to enlist several Spanish friends to translate and transcribe the film as no English subtitles of the film are currently available, and to make sense of the numerous colloquialisms and rapid-fire delivery used by the characters.
After slowing down the video to learn the phonetics and expression of the lines, Ming then re-enacts the scene for recording, which is then speeded up in an attempt to match the original delivery in the film.
In this work the 'real time' (too slow) and speeded up (too fast) recordings are juxtaposed.
With thanks to Jorge Croissier, Anna Cobo Moreno, Montse Gili & Juan Carlos Romero.
