Lulu in Obsidian is a video work made as a response to my reading of Adolfo Bioy Casares’ 1940 novel The Invention of Morel in which an obsessive inventor creates a machine in which recordings of living people can be replayed forever. The model for Faustine in that story was Louise Brooks and the video draws on George Pabst’s 1929 film Pandora’s Box in which she plays Lulu. The material obsidian was historically used for scrying mirrors, devices used for divination, prophesy and communicating with ethereal entities. Lulu in Obsidian was originally made to be distributed by mobile phone at the opening of the group exhibition Obsidiana in Gallery Afa, Santiago, Chile in April 2009, curated by Luna Montenegro and Adrian Fisher. The video was later shown in the group show Star Maker, E:vent Gallery, London, June 2009, curated by David Burrows.

You can watch the video here.