Episode of the Sea is the result of a 2 year collaboration with the fishing community of the former island of Urk in the Netherlands. The film documents the fishermen’s world and their struggle with public perception, regulation and market, while parallels are traced between fishing and image making.
Imagine yourself as an outsider in a fishing community known for being closed, insular and deeply religious. Imagine further that you have been sent there to do artistic fieldwork, only to discover when you arrive that the institution that has dispatched you has withdrawn its support. We strike up a conversation with some fishermen. Like us, they ply a trade that has a long history and enjoy nothing better than to rake it over. When we casually remark that our sector currently suffers somewhat from the image of ‘freeloader’, the fishermen nod that for them, too, the days when they were seen as the heroes of the sea are long gone. Nowadays they are pirates who are fishing the world’s oceans dry. Together we sigh that we share an image problem. This is how our collaboration with the Urkers started.
Imagine yourself as an outsider in a fishing community known for being closed, insular and deeply religious. Imagine further that you have been sent there to do artistic fieldwork, only to discover when you arrive that the institution that has dispatched you has withdrawn its support. We strike up a conversation with some fishermen. Like us, they ply a trade that has a long history and enjoy nothing better than to rake it over. When we casually remark that our sector currently suffers somewhat from the image of ‘freeloader’, the fishermen nod that for them, too, the days when they were seen as the heroes of the sea are long gone. Nowadays they are pirates who are fishing the world’s oceans dry. Together we sigh that we share an image problem. This is how our collaboration with the Urkers started.
