Two canal video, 80 min, 2008
Kamen Stoyanov´s videofilm „Persona“ was shot in a cinema in Sofia in which foreign language films are not shown dubbed or with subtites but are translated by a live interpreter. She sits in a cabin, watches Ingmar Bergman´s Psychodrama „Persona“ and simultaneosly interpretes the dialogue. „Persona“ is famous for its psychological understanding of an exchange of roles. A successful actres suddenly refuses to talk and a nurse takes care of and entertains her. In the process the two women exchange identities: the actress becomes the silent observer and the nurse, who is otherwise the attentive listener, becomes the active talker. Both of them are fascina-ted by the unfamiliarity and strangeness of the other.
Starting from Bergman´s film, Stoyanov shows a simultaneous translation and transfer that takes place on a number of levels. The basis for this is a complex shift of identity it is a figure that also appears whenever a film is viewed. One has to be in the film, to assume the identities, in order to understand the film at all. That goes so far that Stoyanov´s interpreter has similarities with the actress in Bergman´s film. In addtion these shifts are accentuated on the level of translation: from Swedish into Bulgarian and the into written German and English.
Starting from Bergman´s film, Stoyanov shows a simultaneous translation and transfer that takes place on a number of levels. The basis for this is a complex shift of identity it is a figure that also appears whenever a film is viewed. One has to be in the film, to assume the identities, in order to understand the film at all. That goes so far that Stoyanov´s interpreter has similarities with the actress in Bergman´s film. In addtion these shifts are accentuated on the level of translation: from Swedish into Bulgarian and the into written German and English.
Mathias Michalka
