Ezra Wube: "Amora"

Ezra Wube’s Amora is a film that defies singular categorization. In this silent video work, viewers witness a journey through the merging of past and present. Wube combines text and imagery through stop motion animation. He overlaps letters written in the Ethiopian ancient language of Amharic with nomadic figures traveling across a landscape signified by an indistinct map. Wube continues mixing time by using Sumi ink to create his narrative. The ink is traditionally used in Sumi-e paintings, a 2000… Show more year old form of Japanese brush painting. And instead of a canvas, Wube paints directly onto his studio window, washing away the ink after filming each scene. The window is covered in acetate, generating a frost effect, but still allowing for visibility. Wube takes his title from Endeamora, a popular Ethiopian love song written by Jazz singer Alemayehu Eshete. The video’s Amharic script is an excerpt from the song and translates to “like a big bird I will grow wings and fly away.” This is a fragmentary message about the protagonist’s love for Endeamora and the journey to receive her love. Images of distorted construction workers in action serve as the intersecting background to Wube’s narrative and bridge the historical with the contemporary.

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