13BC

56 is a multi-authored moving image work organized by 13BC and loosely inspired by Roberto Bolaño's experimental novel, Antwerp, written in 1980. The book consists of 56 brief, fragmentary chapters that resist easy plot summary, instead suggesting broken threads of a narrative articulated through recurring spaces, characters, gestures, crimes, and interactions. 

Allocated sequentially, each commissioned artist will take a single chapter from the book to use as source material for short films made where they live and work. 56 will therefore become a free-standing omnibus film (with 56 directors) produced in cities and landscapes around the world, including those where the previous chapters are shown. In this regard, 56 is also a touring work that treats spaces of exhibition as sites of collaboration and production, working to eventually fold these multiple spaces and their histories into a composite work.

The first stage of the project took place as part of Over you/ you, the 31st Biennial of Graphic Arts in Ljubljana. For this occasion, 13BC made the first film in the series, 1/56, on-location in Slovenia. 1/56 serves as an artwork, an introduction, a frame, a proposal of method, and a trailer for the future serial film.

Ashim Ajluwalia and Deborah Stratman produced film posters for Over you/ you that anticipate their own future contributions to the series.