Reflective Bodies: This is TMI & Smoke Sauna Sisterhood
Architectures of Intimacy: Reflective Bodies - This is TMI & Smoke Sauna Sisterhood
Documentary Smoke Sauna Sisterhood offers a poetic and unique insight into a traditonal smoke sauna in Estonia, as a place of community and belonging where women share stories and find solace. Preceded by the short animated film This is TMI.
This program explores the relationship and connection we have with our own bodies, and the power of sharing experiences in an intimate setting allowing for a feeling of community, reflection and shared moments of laughter.
Spending time with others in the sauna, we start to reflect on how we relate to our own body and the bodies of others. In the vulnerability of being naked in an enclosed space a unique sense of connection emerges, offering an invitation to share contemplations, personal experiences and secrets kept too long to oneself.
The programme will be introduced by Kato van der Speeten, curator of Architectures of Intimacy.
Programme
This is TMI (Subarna Dash & Vidushi Gupta, IN 2023, 6’)
This is TMI is a playful animation about a group of women having a candid and intimate chat about breasts, large and small, as they compare notes about their perks and troubles, and share startling tales of prejudice. In what ways does being a part of a conservative society affect how we feel about our bodies?
Smoke Sauna Sisterhood (Anna Hints, EE 2023, 89’)
In southeast Estonia, throughout the seasons, a group of women come together in a traditional smoke sauna to cleanse their bodies and share their stories. As they unwind and talk, there is humour borne of their familiarity with each other and of shared experiences, but there are also tales of pain and suffering. It’s as though the hard edges of the outside world are softened by the woodsmoke, steam and the sweat of the women, inviting intimacy and openness.
This is a film that weaves a spell, the camera resting often not on the woman talking but on the person listening to her allowing for an emotional osmosis, even stretching out to the cinema. In observing sauna rituals, these women create space for each other as they each regain the strength they need to face the world outside.
Please note: Smoke Sauna Sisterhood contains explicit references to sexual violence and domestic abuse.
16 through 18 July, Kato van der Speeten will also present the dreamy, poetic virtual reality experience In the Mist.
In collaboration with art cooperative Espacio Estamos Bien, an installation will be presented in the bathrooms near the box office, which will be festively opened on 16 July at 20:30.
This is part of
Details
Production year
2025
Length
113 min.
Event language
English
Country
NL
Subtitles
English
Part of
Programmers of the Future 2025
Three new Programmers of the Future present their film programmes in Eye Filmmuseum this July. With films about the magic of a spontaneous encounter in a public space, about folklore, fairy tales and mythology, and about memory as an act of resistance.
Eye Film Player
Programmer of the Future Kato van der Speeten selected several films to watch at home, including Metal and Melancholy by Heddy Honigmann and Simone van den Broek’s Haarzaak. The films will be available from 8 July.
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