documentary about the fascinating gesamtkunstwerk »ag geige«, the east german folk art collective of which two of the founding members of raster-noton were part of.
»ag geige« was one of the weirdest and most experimental musical projects of the former GDR. founded by four autodidacts, namely jan kummer (visual artist), ina kummer (designer), frank bretschneider (co-founder of rastermusic) and till exit (visual artist), who was later substituted by olaf bender (co-founder of rastermusic, now raster-noton), they defied any classification by producing electronic music combined with dadaist texts and wearing absurd costumes.
the documentary »ag geige - ein amateurfilm« tells the story of this formation that even made it to release an official record short before the fall of the berlin wall. by means of interviews with the protagonists and their supporters, supplemented by video footage of live performances and self-produced clips, the film is focusing on the self-understanding of the four members, their artistic visions, the creative and working process. and, of course, the film also tells the story of the last few years of the GDR system, whose agony made this project possible in the first place.
»ag geige - ein amateurfilm«
documentary by carsten gebhardt
dvd with booklet
length: ca. 80 min.
bonus material: video footage of live performances and self-produced film clips/videos (ca. 50 min.)
subtitles: english
trailer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8x9wizlkBAg
interview with singer jan kummer (german only):
http://www.spiegel.de/einestages/ddr-kultband-ag-geige-saenger-jan-kummer-im-interview-a-989378.html
