About
Inherited Memories explores the notion that traumatic experiences can be passed on to future generations.
In 1941, a young Estonian railway worker was nearly executed for attempting to escape conscription by the occupying forces. Seventy-seven years later, his granddaughter revisits the places from his stories to gain deeper insight into the connections between them.
2022 - 15 min - Colour - DCP - 2x4K - 32:9, 16:9 - 5.1, Stereo
Director: Len Murusalu
Cinematography: Ants Tammik, Kalvis Kulačkovskis, Jaan Kronberg, Roddy Cañas
Sound design: Mike Wyeld
Music: Casino Versus Japan
Producer: Tauno Novek
Financed by: Estonian Cultural Endowment
Premiere: Aesthetica Short Film Festival, UK, 2019
Versions
The preferred format is a 4K projection or a large 16:9 monitor, with subtitles centered under the split-screen. Ideally, the work would be connected to our custom-made LED-light set which is controlled by Arduino and synchronized with the video, so that the space gets brighter at the end of the film. Alternatively, the work can be shown on two side-by-side monitors, with subtitles on one of the screens.
Len Murusalu is an Estonian artist, filmmaker, and film curator. She holds an MA in Contemporary Art Practice: Moving Image from the Royal College of Art in London and a BA in Fine Arts from the University of East London. She is a UnionDocs and Oberhausen Seminar Fellow. In 2018, she founded ChronoLens, a production studio for artists’ film and expanded cinema.
Her long-term research-driven projects bridge documentary and visual art, often highlighting marginalized histories and languages, and has been presented in numerous exhibitions, screening events and film festivals, including Whitechapel Gallery, Kunsthalle Helsinki, Freies Museum Berlin, Estonian Contemporary Art Museum, ISSF Oberhausen, SSFF & Asia, Aesthetica Short Film Festival, Orion Cinema, Preambulo Costa Rica National Film Center, Close-Up Cinema, among others.
Len has contributed to several documentaries as a screenwriter, coordinated artists’ film workshops with Kai Art Center and the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, co-curated the artists’ film programme for the 2021 Tallinn Photomonth biennial, produced the Time Quartet project of 4 artists’ films, and established the expanded cinema programme for the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival. She has guest lectured at the Estonian Academy of Arts, served on the board of the Estonian Documentary Guild, and has been researching and developing artists’ moving image and expanded cinema practices through AmiLab, an NGO she founded in 2020.
Festivals and Screenings
WhiteChapel Gallery – preliminary screening
March 23, 2019. London, United Kingdom.
Aesthetica Film Festival – World Premiere
November 6, 2019. York, United Kingdom.
PÖFF Shorts (Black Nights Film Festival) – Baltic Premiere
November 19, 2019. York, United Kingdom.
Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia 2020
September 17, 2021. Tokyo, Japan.
Swedenborg Film Festival
December 11, 2021. London, United Kingdom.
Stills
