*The Walls Seemed To Be Breathing* is a fictional extension of factual scientific research carried out in 1960s in the Holmesburg Prison, Philadelphia. The film depicts several stories of delirium, latent violence, lucid dreams and bodily hallucination.
The film is loosely based on events that occured in the Holmesburg prison in Pennsylvania from 1960s til 1980s. Formerly dermatological experiments evolved into a CIA-funded psychological research. The original material gives us many interpretational options – seeing it as a micro-version of capitalist exploitation, general relation between authority and submission or universal themes of violence, evil and power. The inmates' testimony serves as mere evidence in the book, yet it sets the default point for building up a fictional narrative, diverting from the socio-political reality and centralizes the violent surreal events of mind maniuplation and scarred skin, a memento that each and every inmate keeps for life.
ES Duration: 8min 20sec
Trade Fair Palace – Presidential lounge
*Max Dvořák, born 1990 in Prague, currently finishing studies at UMPRUM.*
Entrance is free of charge.
