Seas of Pearls

Pferdebusen (Horse Boobs) is the fifth part of a series based on Arthur Schnitzler’s Dream Story. In the text, Katrina Daschner is interested in the ambiguity of fiction and reality, and the tension of unrealized sexual desires. She deconstructs this framework in her development of queer relationship scenarios. In Pferdebusen the filmmaker masterfully succeeds in staging the ruptures and irritations that are so essential for showing and wanting, with subtle humour and grandiose human and non-human actors.

In the seventh part of her adaptation of the “Dream Novel”, Katrina Daschner shines a circus arena’s spotlight on the relationship of a Schnitzleresque couple.

Extremely confident in her mastery of style and taking obvious delight in her citations, in PAROLE ROSETTE, Katrina Daschner uses the performance by a well-rehearsed group of queer couples to stage a controlled game around/about social conventions and (sexual) self-determination, interwoven into an architecturally sublime setting (the Carlo Mollino's Teatro Regio in Turin). - Barbara Reumüller

‘Powder Placenta’ is a fairytale that narrates the interconnectedness of seemingly separate spaces, spheres and strata, and shows how they desire to be intertwined. Once again and at long last, everything becomes one, no matter how it is normally categorized. Longing has come to an end, the celebration of life in all its glory has begun. (Olaf Möller)

A dreary stone grotto populated by mysterious beings lurking in narrow niches, appearing as hordes of zombies with dead eyes, or disturbing with beautifully abhorrent faces. Atmospheric projections intensified by a cataclysmic horror soundtrack to an enthralling ghost train ride through uncanny terrain.

‘Pomp’. Last chapter of the series. The colors blue and gold are dominating this film. ‘The Blue Hour’ – glittering stars at the night sky and on vaudeville stages. Finger dances in golden gloves of satin, full glasses of champagne in circle choreographies, collective ‘Golden Showers’. Performers in bluecatsuits. Everything moving in circles. Pure ‘Pomp’.

Two female performers – as ringmasters, pining lovers and autonomous artists in a personal union – live through “moments of disclosure” before an imaginary audience. With verve, wit and queer femme-ness, they unmask the performance space as a sexualized game subject to viewing conventions, contrasted through shots of the deserted Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía.