N.P

In Spilliaert, filmmaker Lisa Spilliaert inquires into her blood relationship with the renowned Belgian artist Léon Spilliaert (1881-1946). Is she predestined to an artist’s life by this – whether or not – fictitious kinship? Is artistry passed on genetically? She reveals herself as a rapping, fanatical genealogist who probes into the origins of her artistic identity. Visiting all kinds of archives, she first chalks out the historical figure of Léon Spilliaert and his work. At Ostend’s Centre for Genealogy she attempts to substantiate her claim of kinship with certificates and registers. Spilliaert’s narrative structure is strung together by a number of rap poems, performed by Lisa Spilliaert herself. By choosing this form, she uncovers parallels and contrasts between rap music’s free identity construction and the strictly regulated structure of genealogy.

This first video work in collaboration with my sister Lisa Spilliaert is about a double transition. On the one hand, the cultural reorientation from Japan to Belgium and, on the other hand, the transition from child to adolescent, with reference to the advent of sexual awareness. The emotional intencity of leaving a certain place or state is transcended by the ritual gestures of singing, cutting and burning.