La Jungla (Between Light and Shadow)

1985, 13:32 min, b&w, sound

With a stylized juxtaposition of text and image, Labat deconstructs narrative codes as he records everyday life. He constructs a spare, oblique narrative of the relationships between a man and a woman, space and objects, exterior and interior. Panning regularly from left to right, the camera's gaze reveals a couple engaged in the routines of daily life. Suggesting unspoken tensions and intimacies, Labat's visual associations create a chiaroscuro landscape of dreams and memory, in which gesture and detail are caught incidentally. Scrolling across the screen from right to left, a written text engages the viewer in a tangential narrative of displacement and disassociation. Imbuing the ordinary with a compelling resonance, Labat reflects on "the existence of spaces between objects."

Saxophone: Benjamin Bossi. Sound: Rich Sanford. With: Anastasia Labat, Tony Labat.