Resonance in resistance
12 min. 40 sec, Full HD, 5.1., 3-channel-video installation , 2026
In a 3-channel experimental music video installation, two drag* performers and a classical opera singer en travesti perform in an abandoned theatre hall. Each presents a song from experimental soul, Arabic electro, and a classical opera aria written for cross-gender casting, addressing queer love, identity, and their societal constraints, while confronting specific power structures and articulating forms of resistance across personal, cultural, and historical contexts. At the same time, the political and cultural narratives embedded in these musical genres intersect, creating a solidaric dialogue across cultural, political, and gender identities.
Each piece engages with specific power structures and forms of resistance. Mozart’s aria “Non so più cosa son, cosa faccio” expresses the confusion of newly awakened queer desire and questions of gender identity within the framework of an opera that reflects resistance to aristocratic power by casting servants, rather than nobility, as its protagonists. "RDMRDM" explores queer love shaped by religious restriction and postcolonial structures in West Asia, intertwining electronic dance music with melodic material drawn from well-known Arabic folk songs and in this way reclaiming the genre from its white, male-dominated mainstream through a queer decoonial lens. „Soaked in Sin“ approaches queer and trans* identity through the legacy of Soul music as a political genre shaped by the civil rights movement.
Separated across three screens, the performers listen and respond to one another through dance, movement, and lip-sync, becoming resonant bodies for each other’s performances. Performed individually and simultaneously, the songs form both collective and personal moments of resistance.
Attention is drawn to the desynchronization between lip-sync and pre-recorded voice: small hesitations, misplaced breaths, and delays reveal a relation marked by interruption and temporal lag. In lip-syncing each other’s songs, the performers approach their self through the voice of another, embodying borrowed speech as an act of attentive listening and relational becoming.
credits
Cast: Queer Falafel, Idunnu Münch, Mandhla Ndubiwa
Script, Directing, Editing/Buch, Regie, Montage: Binha Haase
Director of Photography /Bildgestaltung: Ginan Seidl Gaffer/ Lichtgestaltung: Sver Immel Theatre lightening/ Theaterlicht: Stefan Streck
Originaltonmeister/Recording Mixer: Jonathan Richter
Score/Filmmusik: Queer Falafel feat. Blast „RDM RDM“, W.A. Mozart „Non so piu cosa son cosa faccio“, Mandhla Ndubiwa „Soaked in Sin“
Costume design (Idunnu Münch)/Kostümbild: Nari Haase, Hair and make up (Queer Falafel)/Maskenbild: Antina Christ
Camera/ Kamera: Tim Nowitzki, Camera assistant/ Kameraassistenz: Merlind Papke, Unit manager/Set-Aufnahmeleitung: Pata Popov
Set photography/Setfotos: Jana Luck
Sound master/Tonmeister Mozart: Lukas Kowalski (Emil Studios)
String quartett/Streichquartett: Meike-Lu Schneider (Vn 1), Rebecca Beyer (Vn 2), Alexina Hawkins (Va), Stefano Cucuzzella (Vc)
Sound mixing/Tonmischung: Jochen Jezussek, Farbkorrektur & Mastering/Colour Grading & Mastering: Desiree Pfenninger
Produziert im Rahmen der/Produced in the framework of: Graduiertenförderung Sachsenanhalt
supported by Werkleitz e.v./unterstützt von Werkleitz e.v.
