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BISFF2024|Correspondence 通信计划:A Flawless Garden 无瑕花园

BISFF Correspondence 通信计划


This program involves conducting brief email interviews with the directors of the international films featured in the festival, in lieu of the traditional Q&A session that follows the screenings. Through this program, we hope to provide a platform for filmmakers to discuss their work and share their insights with our audience in China.


为了跨越种种障碍,开辟更多交流空间,我们设置了“BISFF Correspondence 通信计划”,对部分国际单元的参展作者进行系列访谈,这些访谈将在作品放映后发布在联展各个媒体平台。



A Flawless Garden|Um Jardim Perfeito|无瑕花园

Enrico Piffer

2024|0:08:41|Brazil, UK|Portuguese|World Premiere



Director: Enrico Piffer

Interviewer & Translator: Zifei Wang

Coordinator & Editor: Suliko


导演:恩里科·皮弗尔

采访、翻译:王紫菲

统筹、编辑:苏丽




Q1: What drew you to photographic slides and MINI-DV among all the other forms of "obsolete media"?


在众多“废弃媒介”中,是什么促使您选择幻灯片和MINI-DV作为创作工具的呢?


A1: I believe it had a lot to do with the creative momentum I was experiencing. On one hand, I had just finished a project using Mini-DV and wanted to explore the format further. On the other hand, it was around the same time that I became interested in photographic slides while visiting flea markets and antique galleries. It’s always a magical experience to find a box of slides because you never know what you’ll see until you hold them up to the light. It was a fascinating interaction with the medium, which provoked many questions: 'Where did these slides come from?', 'How did they end up here?', 'Who took these pictures?', 'When was the last time someone looked at them before me?' It felt as if I were an archaeologist uncovering treasures from a different time. Moved by this experience, I felt the urge to dedicate my next project to exploring the format. While researching and experimenting with how I wanted to work with the slides, I noticed a connection between them and Mini-DV camcorders. For example, picture slides were originally designed to be viewed with the aid of a projector, such as the Kodak Carousel. Likewise, the camcorder was designed to work with Mini-DV tapes (among other formats). However, even though slides can be experienced without a projector and camcorders can still work without tape, access to these 'periphery supporting technologies' is much more restricted than it once was. Therefore, since both mediums are outdated in relation to the original purposes for which they were designed, it felt natural to combine them in order to reclaim both within a contemporary context.


这得从我当时的创作动机谈起。一方面,那时我刚完成了一个使用MINI-DV的项目,渴望进一步挖掘这种媒介的潜力;另一方面,正是在那时,我在逛跳蚤市场和古董店的过程中,对幻灯片产生了浓厚的兴趣。每次发现一盒幻灯片都像是一场魔幻之旅,你无法预料其中的图像,只有把它们拿到光源下才能揭开它们的面纱。这种与媒介的互动令我着迷,激发了我许多好奇:“这些幻灯片源自何处?”“它们是怎么流落到这里的?”“是谁拍下了这些照片?”“在到达我受众之前,它们已经多久未被人观赏?”我仿佛成了一名考古学家,挖掘着来自不同时代的珍贵文物。这段体验促使我决定将新项目聚焦于对幻灯片的探索。在研究和实验如何运用幻灯片的过程中,我发现它们与MINI-DV摄像机之间存在着某种联系。比如,幻灯片最初是为了通过投影仪(如柯达Carousel投影仪)观看而设计的;同样,便携式摄像机(camcorder)也是为了使用MINI-DV磁带(以及其他格式)而设计的。尽管现在幻灯片可以无需投影仪直接观看,摄像机也能在没有磁带的情况下操作,但这些“辅助技术”如今已不再像过去那样普及。因此,考虑到这两种媒介在其原始用途上已变得过时,将它们结合起来,在当代语境中赋予它们新的生命,便成了一种自然而然的选择。



Q2: As someone who has worked with found photography over the years, this film feels different from your previous work, particularly in its absence of human subjects. What inspired you to focus on flower photography? If I’m not mistaken, around 20 images were used in the film—did you curate this selection yourself? Could you share more about the stories or significance behind these pictures?


作为一个多年来一直与拾得影像(found photography)打交道的人,这部影片与您以往的作品有所不同,尤其是因为人物在其中的缺席。是什么促使您将目光聚焦于花卉摄影?如果我没记错的话,电影中大约使用了20张图片——这些图片是您亲自挑选的吗?您能否谈谈这些图片背后蕴含的故事或意义?


A2: The process of choosing and curating these images began with questioning the photo slides in my collection. Over the years, this collection grew in diverse ways, including slides from family trips, a hospital archive, educational materials, and more. As I imagined the potential films that could emerge from this collection, a film about flowers caught my attention because of its simplicity. When you look at a landscape or a group photo, there is so much information embedded in the image that it can feel overwhelming—different facial expressions, hairstyles, clothing, background textures, various types of vegetation, cloud patterns, and so on. In contrast, the image of a flower is almost "straightforward" in what it represents. This simplicity allowed me to delve into its details and uncover complexity within the simple. Additionally, although the film is visually absent of human figures, I believe the human presence in the film is as significant as the flowers themselves.


挑选和编排这些图像的过程,源自于对我幻灯片收藏的思考。多年来,我的收藏通过多种途径不断扩充,涵盖了家庭旅行的幻灯片、医院档案、教育材料等。当我在脑海中勾勒出这些收藏可能会孕育的影像时,一组花卉图像因其简洁性吸引了我的目光。相比于⻛景照或集体照中蕴含的繁复信息——如面部表情、发型、服饰、背景细节、植物种类、云层形态等——花卉图像在表达上显得“直接而明了”。正是这份简洁性,使我能够更加专注于其细节,挖掘简单背后的复杂。此外,尽管影片中没有直接显现人类的身影,我坚信,人的存在与花卉之间相互交织,具有同等的重量与深意。



A Flawless Garden, Enrico Piffer, 2024



Q3: I was intrigued by the "movements" within the still images, which seem to come alive through the interplay of lighting and layering. The gradual brightening and dimming of various parts of the image create a visual metaphor for blooming and withering. Could you elaborate on the creative and technical processes behind achieving this dynamic effect?


我被这些静止图像中所呈现的“生命律动”深深吸引,在光影与不同层次的交织下,它们仿佛在悄然苏醒。图像中不同区域的明暗渐变,犹如绽放与凋零的过程,创造出深刻的视觉隐喻。您能否为我们揭示实现这一动态效果的创作理念与技术之道?


A3: During my initial experiments, I focused on finding a method to explore the slides in a way that resembled the experience of holding a slide up to the light to reveal the image within it. In this process, I tested the translucent qualities of the slides in various ways. I experimented with different light colors, textures, and overlaid slides, among other approaches. However, the method that brought me the most satisfaction was programming different moving light setups to play on a screen monitor. When a slide is positioned above the monitor, the movement of the light creates all sorts of dynamic patterns within the images, allowing me to explore what happens when an image is revealed and the suspense surrounding 'what will be revealed next.'


在最初的实验中,我致力于寻找一种方法,复现拿起幻灯片、对准光源并揭露其中图像的那份原始体验。在这一过程中,我探索了幻灯片的半透明特性,尝试了多种技术手段,包括调整光色、变换纹理以及叠加幻灯片。然而,最令我满意的尝试是在屏幕显示器上播放预设的不同动态光源效果。当幻灯片置于显示器上方时,光线的流动在图像中创造出丰富的动态图案,这不仅让我体验到了图像逐渐展现的过程,还营造出了对“接下来会揭露什么”的悬念。



Q4: The sound of shovelling is a dominant element throughout the film. As the decayed images unfold on screen, the ambient sound evokes for me a sense of "unearthing" —bringing these once lost images back to life. How did you approach the sound design, and what were your goals in shaping the film’s sonic landscape?


铲土的声音贯穿整部影片,构成了一个核心的创作元素。当那些经年累月、斑驳腐蚀的图像在屏幕上缓缓展开时,环境音效让我感受到一种“破土而出”的力量——仿佛将这些一度被遗忘的图像重新带回光明。您是如何构思这一声音设计的?在塑造影片的声音景观时,您希望达到什么样的效果?


A4: In this film, I aimed to explore themes related to the act of creation, which, in my view, is a laborious process. To create a garden, one must dig, cut, arrange, rearrange, wait for it to grow, and then cut and rearrange again—it could be endless. Artistic work is not much different. As I was searching for ways to establish a parallel between a garden and the photographic slide medium, suggesting the presence of a worker in the background of the film felt like an interesting connection between the two and helped me "tie" the film together.


在这部影片里,我着眼于挖掘与创造行为相关联的主题,而在我看来,创造是一个艰辛的过程。要建造一个花园,你得挖掘、修剪、布局、重新调整,然后耐心等待它生长,之后又是一轮修剪和调整——这个过程仿佛没有尽头。艺术创作亦复如是。我试图将花园与幻灯片这一媒介联系起来,而让影片背景中隐约呈现一位劳作者的身影,不仅巧妙地连接了两者,也帮助我将影片的各个层次有机地结合起来。



A Flawless Garden, Enrico Piffer, 2024



Q5: The poem seems to explore the paradoxes of nurturing, where the caring pursuit of perfection can lead to pain, disillusionment, and emptiness. I am curious about the identities of "I" and "You" in the poem—are they intended to be specific, or open to interpretation? Could the imagery of gardening serve as a self-reflexive lens for your relationship with artmaking? As the "gardener," you tend to your creations with an aspiration for perfection—a process that is both empowering and yet fraught with emotional and existential risks, much like cultivating a garden.


影片中的诗歌似乎在探讨培育过程中的矛盾情感:对完美之物的呵护与追求,往往伴随着痛苦、幻灭和空虚。我对诗中“我”和“你”的身份感到好奇——它们是指特定的个体,还是有更开放的解读?花园这一意象,是否象征着一种自我反思的视角,映射着您与艺术创作之间的关系?作为“园丁”,您怀着对完美的追求去照料自己的创作——这一过程既令人振奋,又蕴含情感与存在主义层面的挑战,恰如耕耘一座花园。


A5: As an artist, I am more interested in creating work that suggests ideas or evokes questions, rather than being overly specific. Of course, there was a 'logic' behind every decision made in the work; however, I don’t think this logic matters. What matters to me are the connections one might draw between the elements resulting from this logic. When I first envisioned this film, I was calling it ‘Flowers’ and focusing on each slide individually. But later in the process, I realized that the images actually share the same dark space that surrounds them. From this abstract notion of a metaphorical shared space, an interesting tension emerged between the idea of caring for a garden and the fragility that is shared with the medium I was working with. Similarly to a garden, a photographic slide or a MINI-DV camcorder decays over time, and the aspirations of a gardener or an artist, for example, become ephemeral within the 'lifespan' of their creation. From this point on, my concern was to create layers within the work to investigate the existential complexity and ambiguities of 'creating,' exploring the peripheral themes that surround this topic, such as— as you pointed out— nurturing, care, pain, disillusionment, emptiness, perfection, obsession, etc.


作为一名艺术家,我更倾向于创作那些能够激发思考或提出问题的作品,而非过于直白地表达。诚然,每个创作决策背后都有一套 “逻辑”,但我认为,这种逻辑本身并不是最重要的。对我而言,真正关键的是这些逻辑所引发的不同元素之间的相互联系。在最初构思这部影片时,我将其命名为《花朵》,并专注于每张幻灯片的独立呈现。然而,在后期制作中,我意识到所有这些图像实际上都被同一片黑暗空间包围。这个充满隐喻性的共享空间的抽象概念,让我发觉,照料花园的行为与我所使用的媒介之间,存在着一种共通的脆弱性,这种张力非常有趣。就像花园会随时间逐渐凋零,幻灯片和MINI-DV也会随着时间的推移而衰退,园丁或艺术家的愿景在他们作品的“生命周期”中也只是昙花一现。基于这一认识,我试图在我的作品中创造层次,以探索“创作”这一行为的复杂性与模糊性,同时讨论与这一主题相关的各种话题,比如你提到的:培育、关怀、痛苦、幻灭、空虚、完美、执念等。



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