Regional Express

A living heritage project for the European Capital of Culture Bad Ischl Salzkammergut 2024 by Petra Ardai, Ella Raidel, and Marlene Rutzendorfer.

The train in motion as a narrator, time travelers, and the landscape as cinema.

www.regional-express.org

The regional train and the surrounding landscape from Gmunden to Bad Aussee serve as the stage for this audiovisual docu-fiction. Memories of humans and non-humans retell the story of the Salzkammergut from multiple perspectives. Passengers can hear a conversation between the Train, the Mountain, and the Traunsee Mermaid, interwoven with stories of the local population.

Amsterdam-based documentary theater maker and scenario writer Petra Ardai interviewed locals to create a docu-fiction narrative about how the landscape, the salt, and the industry formed the region. Which powers shaped structures that are still present? What is the place of tradition in the future?

The train journey is divided into five excursions. You can hop op in Gmunden, Ebensee, Bad Ischl, Hallstatt and Bad Aussee. The audio-visual material is arranged according to the scenery. Renowned actress and narrator Chris Lohner, the official voice of all railway stations in Austria, accompanies us on this imaginary journey in the role of the Train. The experience can be accessed via the QR code below and from March 2024 via the Salzkammergut Culture Guide App. Bring your headphones to listen to the story.

Access the story from here.

In August 2024, the story continues as a cinematic virtual reality experience directed by filmmaker Ella Raidel. The Cine VR takes the audience into caves, mines, and landscapes around the Salzkammergut region in 360° videos. This immersive journey can be viewed through VR glasses provided at the venues.

Estonian Composer Sander Saarmets collected sounds in participatory workshops with people from the region. Susi Jirkuff’s distinct, delicate line drawings connect the audio-visual experience of Regional Express through various media on the App, website, and graphic design.

Marlene Rutzendorfer is the curator, producer, and researcher of the project. Having grown up in the region, she not only coordinated the international team of multidisciplinary artists working on Regional Express but also established a close connection to the area by involving an extensive network of locals.

Facebook

Instagram: #regionalexpress2024

Press:

“Austria’s Salzkammergut bets on arts, culture to reboot region in 2024,” by Ong Sor Fern, The Straits Times Singapore, 14.02.2024. Link

Moshammer, Mariella. ”Geschichten von Riesenkraken, während der See vorbeifließt.“ Volksblatt, 22.01.2024, Link

A preview of the European Capital of Culture Bad Ischl 2024 and the project Regional Express, in „Schaufenster,“ Die Presse, Philipp, Norbert. 15.12.2023, Regional Express is an audio-visual experience on the train and in cine virtual reality for the European Capital of Culture Bad Ischl 2024 by Petra Ardai, Ella Raidel, and Marlene Rutzendorfer. Link

Lebensg’schichten: Ella Raidel, Video portrait, Salzi TV, produced by Melanie Jungwirth. Link

DER BERG

DER BERG – The Mountain
A project for the Festival of the Region 2015 by Clemens Bauder, Felix Ganzer, Ella Raidel

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During the 2015 Festival of Regions, The Mountain project will go on an expedition on the Traunsee lasting several days with a floating object shaped like a mountain. Ebensee will serve as the starting- and finishing-point whence the expeditionary voyage around the lake commences, landing at various places on the shores or simply appearing there. It is a journey into the unknown for a courageous crew with a variety of characters who will be recruited. They are passengers, but also protagonists of a narrative or film-script who actively drive happenings on, for The Mountain will become the stage and platform for performances and happenings. Stories, sagas, sounds and drawings are the voyage’s products. At night the vehicle will change its appearance through light-interventions or simply through the moonlight and, insofar as a calm lake permits, The Mountain will allow itself to drift, to be spied from shore or visited by boot. It is a voyage into a real, but also imaginary world with a self-made vessel in a scenery that has been enveloped in sagas since time immemorial. The object’s making and its expedition serve as the vehicle for writing a new story as the basis for the film BERG.

Collaborating Artists: Richard Eigner (Sound), Billy Roisz (Sound), Sander Saarmets (Sound), Karin Peschka (Text), Jianan Qu (Performance), Sonia Borkowicz (Perfomance),Vilte Swarplyte (Performance) Georg Pinteritsch (Drawings), Victor Gaso (Cook)

Foto (night): Norbert Artner

Results of the collaboration were presented in an installation at OK Center for Contemporary Art/Tankstelle Dametzstrasse:

Fotos: Gregor Graf

Double Happiness

Double Happiness intersects the real and the fake through visual imagery

Upcoming Screenings

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Metaphorm

Ella Raidel _Metaphorm_2013_Kinmen Island, 金城海濱公園, Kinmen Island, Jincheng Beach Park

480cm (L) x 330cm (W) , Concrete

The work can be a shelter, pavilion or dwelling place. The visual lexicon of its form is derived from nature. It is a fantasia of spatial experience located at the site where the skies meet the sea. Whether from a seated or standing perspective, the vista of the outside world from within the shelter becomes a language of form that differentiates interiority from exteriority. Light moves between the two realms to accent the plight of nature and man.

作品是房子、屏蔽，也是人的居處及堡壘。從大自然轉換而來的形式語彙，象徵母體的誕生與屏障，同時也印證著不斷與自然搏鬥的歷史，結晶為文化的人類活動。一方面，與金門的戰地碉堡的人為環境對話，另一方面也映照著周遭利用岩洞築巢而居的鳥類，在海天一色的環境中轉換為奇幻的空間經驗。讓人從人或坐或臥的休憩，從窗口仰望屏蔽外的世界，區分出內與外的形式語言的換喻，光線在之間穿越，裝點出自然與人的處境。

Short Videoclip

The Making of Metaphorm

Landungsplatz Ebensee

Landing-Place Ebensee / Landungsplatz Ebensee 2004

The site of Landing Place in Ebensee carries a major historical significance. The salt mined in Hallstatt has been shipped to here and further distributed over cities in Europe for centuries. To footnote such significance, a pier will be installed in a shape similar to the docking area of traditional salt boats.The pier is a functional platform that creates a place and an occasion for gathering, relaxing, and sightseeing. With its 10-meter length and no supporting column underneath, the pier produces an illusion of floating over the water.

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