Dream Steam

Literally with the arrival of the first steam train, “excursionists” began to appear in the Poberouní region – weekend guests who built cottages here for recreation and began to pile new deposits onto the geological layers, this time in the form of memories captured by recording devices. The audiovisual dimension of one region's memory is the subject of this experimental documentary, assembled from found footage taken by its residents over the course of nearly a century. It is based on the memoirs of Gizela Šmidlíková, published in newspapers in the 1990s, and on various visual and ideological associations developed against a hypnotic musical backdrop. “Using a contemplative, observational 'non-documentary' approach, I processed the memory of a place, the depiction of local cultural life and the great importance of the railway to all of the Lower Poberouní region.”Source: Magdaléna Kašparová