Singing in Oblivion

“I am an echo chamber of forgotten lives and disappeared worlds, a free-floating song, heaven walks the earth.” Vienna’s Jewish Währinger cemetery opened to the public in 1784, during an era of tolerance and prosperity that coincided with the dawn of photography. With the rise of Nazism, this historical jewel of a Biedermeier cemetery was variously desecrated and became an overgrown wilderness, though passersby noted it sounded as if a paradise of birds was locked behind its high stone walls. The graveyard today bears further scars of neglect, left to the uncontrolled growth of ancient trees. The film footage was shot on location with images painstakingly lifted from antique glass negatives and printed one frame at a time in a darkroom onto 35mm film strips. In honor of refugees past, present and future.