Works&Projects

Synopsis:

Joao Penalva’s film The White Nightingale presents a forensic-like exploration of the bed of the River Avon under the Clifton Suspension Bridge, one of Bristol’s primary icons and the subject of many stories and myths.

Brunel's Clifton suspension bridge, spanning the Avon Gorge, is a beautiful and breath-taking piece of engineering, the bridge is an icon of Bristol's cityscape. Its story began in 1754 with a Bristol wine merchant who left a legacy to build a bridge over the Gorge. 24 year old Isambard Kingdom Brunel was eventually declared the winner and appointed project engineer - his first major commission. The foundation stone was laid in 1831 but the project was dogged with political and financial difficulties.

It is also the subject of urban myths and the site of many suicide attempts, and it is this aspect of dread and loss of self that the bridge evokes which captivated Penalva and became the subject for his film. The White Nightingale undertakes a forensic-like exploration of the bed of the River Avon under Clifton Suspension Bridge. The 45 minute long piece entwines forensic-like footage of the river bed under the Clifton Suspension Bridge with the narrative of a written Hans Christian Anderson-like dark folk tale. The images, evocative soundtrack, fairy tale and installation combined to create a brooding atmosphere where the audience could suspend their disbelief and be carried along with the river and the narrative.

Penalva's dream-like journey draws on documentary footage to construct a fiction and to conjure fantastical places. What began as an exploration of the mud-banks and the bed of the River Avon becomes a mythical tale of quest and wonder.