The Suite (212) Sessions, no. 12 - Deimantas Narkevičius

In the wake of the coronavirus epidemic and shutting down of much of the UK's cultural life, we have decided to bring you a series of interviews with contemporary artists, writers, filmmakers and other cultural figures, conducted via Skype (so apologies for the diminished audio quality), about their practices, the political issues that inspire them and the socio-economic conditions that have shaped their work. In the twelfth of these Sessions, Juliet talks to artist and filmmaker Deimantas Narkevičius about how the Covid-19 crisis has played out in his native Lithuania, its effect on his teaching work and artistic practice, his forthcoming feature film on stereoscopic photography and his previous works dealing with Soviet monuments and cultural memory. Then they discussed several of Narkevičius’ films in detail: The Role of a Lifetime (2003), made with English filmmaker Peter Watkins; Once in the XX Century (2004); Revisiting Solaris (2007), in which Narkevičius filmed the final chapter of Stanisław Lem’s science fiction novel, which was left out of Andrei Tarkovsky’s 1972 adaptation; and Restricted Sensation (2011), dealing with the treatment of gay men in the Soviet Union in the 1970s. A full list of references for the programme, with links, can be found via our Patreon at www.patreon.com/suite212, and are available to $3 subscribers.