Passing

Passing

Twinning sleight of hand magic and visual impairment, Passing is a short film which invites us to pay attention to the barely visible yet highly choreographed ways in which we all perform, or pass, on stage and in everyday life. 

We meet two performers, Augusto, a Sleight of Hand magician, and Sindri, a visually impaired dancer, who allow us to observe them at work. We pay close attention to Augusto’s hands as they perform a series of magic tricks; we are invited to witness the complex choreographies of Sindri’s tactile navigation of space and objects.

It is a strange duet, a funny kind of twinning, a kinship. We begin to notice parallels in the learnt, repeated, highly precise actions of the performers. And another kinship emerges.

All of this work, if done correctly, doesn’t look like work at all. Theirs is a labour of concealment and misdirection. Their skill is to conceal their own virtuosity, to appear at ease, to pass as if they’re not doing anything remarkable at all. 

Objects, hands and bodies fall in and out of focus. The camera and ASMR sound design hone in on the intimacy of touch, the precision of choreography, the labour that both performers undertake. It brings into relief the contrast between this effortful work, and the seeming ease of the performers. It makes us see that this performance of ease is a central part of their labour.

Experimenting with sensory modes of seeing, including audio description, tactile cinematography, ASMR sound design and close up choreographies, the work attempts to disrupt the primacy of vision by proposing a more embodied, up close and personal mode of ‘seeing’.

As always, Jo’s work is guided by her offbeat humour and her ongoing fascination with objects, visual perception and how strange the ordinary world really is…

Passing is part of BLIND MAGIC: A triptych of artworks exploring the performativity of visual impairment. A film Passing, an installation Sleight of Hand and a live performance The Dirty Work created by Jo Bannon