Chantal Akerman (1950–2015) is the filmmaker behind Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (1975), the film that the major critics survey conducted by magazine Sight and Sound. Shortly after the collapse of the Soviet bloc, Akerman travelled from East Germany across Poland and Ukraine to Moscow. The resulting film, From the East (D’Est, 1993), has no dialogue and no commentary. Long, slow tracking shots on 16 mm follow people waiting at stations, walking through snow and standing in queues, capturing a suspended state in the midst of uppheaval.
In 1995 Akerman turned the film into her first installation, with scenes looping across 25 monitors. Together with the cellist Sonia Wieder-Atherton, she also created D’Est en musique, a concert performed to footage from the film, which had its New York premiere in 2025 in connection with MoMA’s Akerman retrospective. On 26 October, the artists Niklas Fite and Raymond Strid interpret the film with their own improvised music, at a private screening presented by Art Initiative.
Chantal Akerman screening with live performance: From the East with Niklas Fite & Raymond Strid.
Join us for an art evening on 26 October at 18.00 in KAW, where musicians Niklas Fite and Raymond Strid improvise live to Chantal Akerman’s film From the East (D'est, 1993), and Benjamin Wagner presents his new Swedish translation of her book “Ma mére rit”, Min mamma skrattar (Filmögon, 2026).
From the East
Min mamma skrattar
Chantal Akerman was uniquely gifted in several art forms, and this evening includes a short reading from the Swedish translation of her most well-known book, Ma mère rit (Min mamma skrattar, Filmögon 2026). The publication has been hailed as an important event in the cultural sphere and the book has been reprinted due to popular demand.
Min mamma skrattar draws on Akerman’s own life and her relation with her mother, and as in the film No Home Movie (2014), the mother’s silence in relation to her family history emerges as a decisive element in Akerman’s artistic production. In D’Est, Akerman returns to the geographic sites of her family’s origin, mirroring this silence in the film’s lack of dialogue.
Voices about the Swedish translation of Min mamma skrattar by Chantal Akerman in Swedish media:
”Brilliant translation by Benjamin Wagner … a major deed for culture” — DAGENS NYHETER
”A compelling read” — SVENSKA DAGBLADET
”Striking directness” — EXPRESSEN
”Great art” — BERNUR
The Artists
