Mapping Black Europe

Christopher Pastor

The first thing that caught my eye was the short film, black magic at the white house. I really loved the dancing, it really captivated my attention. It really went with the theme, like despite being ignored she was still there, dancing. She is dancing, it seems like a cultural voodoo dance. Throughout most of the video she is barely visible with a slight vision of her motion, with her appearing a mere seconds a couple times.  Despite being colonized she keeps her culture and seems to refuse to let it go. She unapologetically dances in this "white house" that I think is her trying to say something about our president right now. How she feels towards him. I think its very inspirational, like she is being forgotten and actively ignored yet she persists because she refuses to let her culture die or let society define her. Its no longer about her but her culture and its history, its a form of resistance, how she is dancing in a house made by salves that she acknowledges and in this short film forces the audience to acknowledge. When being taught history, we talk about Europe and brush over that they did in fact have slaves but usually is more focused on American slaves. 

Girl dancing from the short film black magic at the white house.

It's important to know your history, and in this film she bares her emotion towards the slave owning in Denmark. She does not try to shy away or sugar coat it but instead full acknowledge it by dancing in this house from a slave owner. She's embracing the past of what was but also, showing while it may not being studied its not lost, that she and surely others still preserve her culture. Also dancing in the house of the slave owner is almost like giving it to "the man" in a way. 

She is making some type of picture for this dance she is doing in Black magic at the White house.

The next video that I saw was Nigra Videri when I typed it into google translate means, black thought, which is a really pretty name. Throughout the film she is just walking it seems like on the way to her house of some sort. It seems like she takes this route a lot. But it is only her, no one else is around, and she says "I'm there when I want to". Almost as if she can just become invisible on command. It seems like no one pays her any attention so I don't think its that no one is actually there on the train but instead she feels alone.  

a picture of this girl riding the train in Nigra Videri.

Than a particular scene interests me, she goes into this white screen and climbs on top of a crow. It reads to me as if she's going into her own little world flying above the world, which from her eyes is predominantly white, and the world says creation from it, almost as if its excluding her from it despite being part of it. Like white people founded and created the world and she just lives on top of it but does not feel necessarily part of it. She did not belong. I think both of these films did an amazing job of conveying emotion and depicted a very clear story.

Girl getting on top of a black crow in Nigra Videri.

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This is a picture from the short film Black 

s to be a voodoo cultural dance