a tale of petrochemicals | 14m, video, social practice, 2020

a tale of petrochemicals is a video in which three custom marionettes, three voiceover actors, and a musician, reenact an interview the artist undertook whilst on residence in the Italian town of Ferrara, Italy.

In conversation with the Italian puppeteer Vittorio Zanella, the discussion focusses on his father’s involvement at the local Montedison factory in 1963, the year his colleague Giulio Natta jointly won the Nobel Prize for the development of Polypropylene (the second most used plastic in the world today). Highlighting plastics role in medicinal technologies, workers' health, and cultural life, the conversation begins with basic information regarding its development in the area, moving on to discuss the environmental, pathological, legal, and domestic effects of the material in regions of Northern Italy.

Furthermore, with the third puppet acting as a translator between the artist and the puppeteer, the video raises questions around the formation of histories in their process of translation into another language.