An activity shaped by the physical relation between human and animal, the classical dressage of horses as portrayed in Yalda Afsah’s short film Centaur reveals an ambivalence between care and control, physical strength and broken will. Paired with recurring shots of historical paintings adorning the riding hall, Afsah’s intimate observations – abstractions of fur and flexing muscles in conjunction with a rhythmic layer of sound – evoke a sense of artificiality eerily similar to the aesthetic discipline of dressage itself, which seems to raise the controversial question whose nature is cultivated by whom.

The short movie Tourneur documents a bull fight in the South of France and comments in a subtle manner the disparity between the young, adrenaline rushed participants and the physically superior bull, which gets cornered by the participants. The unpredictability of the situation is increased by foam, which affects the view of the participants and the audience therefore, the encounter of humans and animal seem like an alienation in this abstract landscape of foam.

The experimental documentation “BOY” tells on the one hand the story of an afghan girl, which is raised as a “Bacha Posh” in Afghanistan, Mazar-e-Sharif, and on the other hand the one of a young woman, who used to dress like a boy to gain more freedom in the afghan society and street life.
The tradition “Bacha Posh” means that girls are dressed as boys and have to fulfill the function of a male family member since very young.Usually the get married as girls or have to switch to their biological gender when they´re sexually mature.
Faranoz is 13 years old and was raised as “Bacha Posh” and lives consciously all the liberties and duties of a boy, beginning with playing football with the other boys up to making the groceries for the older sister, which lives alone as a single mother.
Elaha is a 24-year old singer, which lives in London. She decided as a teenager, before her migration from Afghanistan, to pretend to be a boy in order to live more or less a self-determined life.

A Film by Yalda Afsah and Ginan Seidl

The two-channel installation „Bacha Posh“ narrates through atmospheric pictures of urban landscapes and close observations the life of an 13 year-old afghan girl which is raised as a boy in Afghanistan and who consciously lives all the duties and liberties of her role. The tradition “Bacha Posh” means that girls are dressed as boys and have to fulfill the function of a male family member since very young. The two Screens stand for the outer and inner space, the public and the private life.

A Film by Yalda Afsah and Ginan Seidl

A temporary object in a public space.
A house in Istanbul, provisionally covered during building work. The line of vision of the viewer is directed by the movement of the wind. With the initial framing, the dimensions of the fluid facade are seen without sense of proportion and only with the fleeting insights into the inner workings do the fractions become visible.

In reference to „Kabatas,“ the second part of the trilogy, „Fillmore“ was made in San Francisco. The sequence of images begins with a close-up of the covered house and, as in Kabatas, ends with a long shot to establish the spacial relationship.Electricity cables and traffic systems transform into abstract lines in front of the white „canvas“ of the covered buildings.
Background and foreground merge into a flat plane.

The last part of the trilogy, which is filmed in Berlin, is introduced with a pan shot.
Two parts of a viaduct, of different architectural styles, are left uncovered and in contrast to the external facade.
The montage brings about a comparison.
In contrast to Kabatas and Fillmore the film begins with a long shot and slowly closes in on detail.