Unmade Film

Unmade Film is an expansive collection of audio-visual works that point to the structure of a film but never fully become one. Unmade Film takes as its starting point the mental hospital Kfar Sha'ul in Jerusalem. Initially specialising in the treatment of Holocaust survivors – including a relative of the artist – it was established in 1951 using the remains of the Palestinian village Deir Yassin that had been depopulated in a massacre by Zionist paramilitaries in April 1948. The work and its different elements evolved out of exchanges and collaborations with psychologists, psychiatric nurses, historians, musicians, pupils, amateur actors, curators, artists and others. The publication of Unmade Film brings together the different works by Uriel Orlow and texts expanding on the themes of Unmade Film, including the historical context (Ilan Pappé), discussions around trauma and haunting (Yo’ad Ghanadry and Avery Gordon), film without film (Erik Bullot), a critique of ruins (Esmail Nashif)