Opening: Ghana Pavilion / Venice Biennale 2019
May 2019
Three channel HD colour video installation, 7.1 sound
52 minutes
Director: John Akomfrah
Producers: Lina Gopaul, Ashitey Akomfrah and David Lawson
Four Nocturnes forms the third part of a trilogy of films including Vertigo Sea and Purple that explore the complex intertwined relationship between humanity’s destruction of the natural world and our destruction of ourselves. Using Africa’s declining elephant populations as its narrative spine, Four Nocturnes is staged as a set of impressionist meditations on fugitive time(s), on improper light and the unnamed scandal. The film questions mortality, loss, fragmented identity, mythology, and memory through poetic visuals that survey the landscape of African cultural heritage.