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Mila Zhluktenko
& Daniel Asadi Faezi

–

In the IBB Video Space

Film still: A side view of an elderly person standing in front of the wreckage of a boat, arms folded behind their back, gazing into the distance.

Daniel Asadi Faezi & Mila Zhluktenko, Aralkum, 2022

© Daniel Asadi Faezi & Mila Zhluktenko, Courtesy Daniel Asadi Faezi & Mila Zhluktenko

rückblickend betrachtet (in retrospect, 2025)

“rückblickend betrachtet” (in retrospect, 2025, 14 min.) brings together three different historical moments. Munich’s Olympia-Einkaufszentrum or Olympia shopping mall was largely built in the 1970s by so-called “guest workers” and was considered the largest shopping centre in Europe at the time. In 1982, the Iranian director Sohrab Shahid Saless made the film “Empfänger unbekannt” (Addressee Unknown) in response to the increasingly overt hostility directed towards people labelled as “foreign” in West Germany. In 2016, nine people were murdered in a far-right terrorist attack at the Olympia-Einkaufszentrum. Zhluktenko and Asadi Faezi weave these layers together to show that racist violence is not an isolated phenomenon, but part of a continuing historical trajectory.

  • The exhibition handout is available in German, Easy German and English.
  • There is no information in German Sign Language.
  • The room is unlit.
  • The work “Aralkum” is in spoken Karakalpak with English subtitles. 
  • The work “in retrospect” is in spoken German and has English subtitles
  • The sound comes through loudspeakers.
  • Assistive listening is not supported by induction systems or neck loops.
  • There is step-free access to the exhibition. The floor in the Video Space is fitted with a low-pile carpet.
  • The videos can be watched sitting down.
  • There are seats. Wheelchairs and folding stools can be borrowed free of charge from the cloakroom. 
  • The handout has been designed with good contrast. 
  • The IBB Video Space has no floor guidance system and no tactile models.

Click here for information about museum accessibility.

Do you have any other questions about accessibility? Christine van Haaren, Head of Education and Outreach will be happy to answer them via e-mail haaren@berlinischegalerie.de or via phone +49 (0)30-789 02-836.

Events

24
August
Monday
Event

Speaking of Video Art

An open discussion on the current programme at the IBB Video Space

27
August
Thursday
Opening

Opening: Josef Kaiser

As part of the exhibition “Josef Kaiser: Building for the GDR”

Get your tickets now!

Buy tickets
Film still: The still shows a desert-like landscape with a few bushes in the evening sun.

Videoart online

The video work “Aralkum” (2022, 14 Min.) can also be streamed online until 7.9.26.

Watch here

Aralkum (2022)

“Aralkum” (2022, 14 min.) was the first video work co-directed by Mila Zhluktenko and Daniel Asadi Faezi. The film serves as a memorial to the Aral Sea, the fourth-largest inland sea in the world until the 1960s, though it has now almost entirely dried up. Its transformation into a barren desert landscape is particularly visible in the border region between Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. A vast expanse of arid land (the “Aralkum” of the title) now covers the area that was once a body of water. The video conveys with striking clarity how human intervention, specifically the Soviet Union’s destructive irrigation policies in support of cotton production, gradually destroyed an entire ecosystem and the life it sustained. The two filmmakers combine archival material with contemporary footage. Images of nature, still hauntingly beautiful despite the catastrophe, appear alongside intimate family scenes and shots of preserved animal specimens.

The Artists

Mila Zhluktenko and Daniel Asadi Faezi studied documentary filmmaking at the University of Television and Film (HFF) Munich. Their films have been screened and honoured at numerous international festivals, including the award for Best Short Film at Visions du Réel for “Aralkum”. “rückblickend betrachtet” premiered at the 75th Berlin International Film Festival, and it received the German Short Film Award.

IBB Video Space

Since 2011 the IBB Video Space has been screening artists who work with time-based media. The programme features not only established names in contemporary video art but also up-and-coming artists rarely seen in museums to date. For these, the Berlinische Galerie seeks to facilitate an institutional début.

Each screening brings a new encounter with work that raises questions about the medium and about social or political issues. Importance is attached to including marginalised perspectives and to shedding light on the impact of power structures.