Nina Fischer & Maroan el Sani

The Rise

HD / 35 mm, colour, Dolby Digital, 18 min. 2007

'The Rise' is about a man, who is standing at the window of his office in a high-rise. He watches a twin brother who is climbing up the outside stairs of an adjacent office building. As if lost in a Piranesi engraving the man ascends the stairs of a building continuously and when he thinks he has made it to the top, he only finds out that he has to start all over again. An endless journey, through different weather zones, passing several obstacles, fighting against phobia and other opponents. On top of the building he discovers that someone is watching him: his alter ego. He turns around and is doomed to start climbing from zero again.
'The Rise' shows the uncanny, the unforeseen, which lurks directly under the glossy surface of the modern environment. Moments in which the fragility of the layer of civilisation is noticeable.
We wanted to focus on the complex relationship between the visual language of a building, its psychological effects and the political-economic reality in which it functions.
The film location is Raphael Vignoly's building in Amsterdam ZuidAS, which was actually designed for the competition for the new World Trade Center in New York, but was finally not realised there.

Movie
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The Rise
HD / 35 mm, colour, Dolby Digital, 18 min. 2007
(excerpt 1.59 min.)