LAUGHING, video with sound, 2016, 2018

Video duration: 0:55 minutes; video image dimensions: 200 x 196 cm; image and sound editing: Kristina Horvat Blažinović; voice in the video: Gabrijel Hlebec; photo in the video: Ein Hund macht Kunststücke, author unknown, taken from Taschen’s wall calendar “Berlin”, 2012.

Description:
The video piece Laughing (duration: 52 seconds) features a static photograph with an animated head of a boy laughing. An initially recorded audio of the boy laughing has been added to the image. The photograph used, Ein Hund macht Kunststücke, is by an unknown author and was sourced from Taschen’s wall calendar “Berlin” from 2012. It depicts an urban scene with an old man, a dog, and children. The old man is playing with the dog, and the children watch happily. The boy on the right is particularly interesting. While all the other children are watching the dog, which has risen to its hind legs and smiles shyly and reservedly, the boy on the right laughs with his mouth open and eyes closed, giving the impression that he belongs to another time and space. The inspiration for this video is precisely that detail. To me, it is the place—the punctum, as Roland Barthes describes.
Although in the background of the photograph, outside the centre of the action, the boy’s face draws and fixes the gaze. He seems to be absent and lost in his inner world. His laughter (whether genuine or forced), disconnected from the scene he observes, appears to be an internal laughter, with its source somewhere else.
Video:
The video plays on a loop. The sound recording of the boy’s simulated, artificial, “violent” laughter is constantly repeated. Laughter that repeats in a loop ceases to be genuine and acquires a hint of the traumatic – forced, unnatural laughter can serve as a defence mechanism against fear or anxiety. Continuous spontaneous laughter is not impossible – persistence can lead to forced laughter, which is an unpleasant experience that demands great effort. What should be enjoyable in itself becomes a source of discomfort and unease