Julian Rosefeldt | In the Land of Drought

In his meditative installation In the Land of Drought (2015/17), Rosefeldt looks back from an imagined future upon the post-Anthropocene: the aftermath of significant human influence on Earth. An army of scientists appears to investigate archeologically at the remnants of civilization after humanity has made itself extinct. Shot entirely using a drone in Morocco and the Ruhr area of Germany, Rosefeldt's images hover meditatively over desolated landscaped and ruins – abandoned film sets close to the Moroccan Atlas Mountains and the remains of industrialization. In the Land of Drought evokes—without any dialogue—a vision of a future exodus of humanity from our devastated planet.

Playing with the black-and-white esthetic of silent movies, Deep Gold (2013–14) is shot in a film studio, with complicated camera movements and a sophisticated dramatic choreography. Conceived as a possible continuation of the legendary film L'Âge d'or (1930) written by Luis Buñuel and Salvador Dali, it is a visual poem, a surrealist trip back to the Berlin of the wild 1920s, characterized by artistic avant-garde, sexual freedom and political apocalypse. Six photographic prints of the film stills accompany the film installation at Galerie Ron Mandos.