Bigert & Bergström, "The Last Supper", 2005
Edition of 1000. DVD. 57 min.
Exhibitions
2005
Gothenburg International Film Festival Jan. 29 - Feb. 6
Milliken Gallery, Stockholm, Feb. 26 - March 26
Cinemanilla International Film Festival, Philippines, Oct. 12 – 25
Molodist International Film Festival, Kiev, Oct. 22 – 30
Kunstnerernas Hus, Oslo, Oct. 28 - Dec. 4
IDFA International Film Festival, Amsterdam, Nov. 25 - Dec. 4
"Silver Wolf Competition"
2006
True/False Intternational Film Festival,
Columbia Missouri, Feb. 24 - 26
Nelson Gallery, UC Davis, San Francisco, March 30 – May 30
New School Vera List Centre for Art & Politics, New York
Screening and symposium, April 3
True/False International Film Festival, Bellingham,
Washington, April 21 - 23
DOCUMENTA International Film Festival, Madrid, May 5 - 14
INPUT International TV Conference, Taipei, Taiwan, May 7 - 12
Planete Doc Review International Film Festival, Warsaw, May 12 - 21
Banff International Television Festival, Calgary, June 9 - 12
"Nominated for best Social & Political Documentary"
Auckland International Film Festival, New Zealand July 13 - 30
EIDF International Documentary Festival, Seoul, July 10 - July 16
Wellington International Film Festival, New Zealand, July 20 - Aug. 6
Dallas Video Festival, August 8 - 13
IFC Center, New York, Screening August 21
1st. Singapore Biennial, Sept. 4 – Nov. 12
Calgary International Film Festival, Sept. 22 - Oct. 1
Docville International Film Festival, Leuven, Belgium,
Sept. 28 – Oct. 3. "1st prize in competition"
Cornell Cinema, Ithaca, NY, screening Oct. 4
Tallinn Art Hall, Estonia, Oct. 27 - Dec. 10
Docusur, International Film Festival, Tenerife, Oct. 22 - 29
Jihlava, International Film Festival, Czech Republic, Oct. 24 - 29
Golden Chest, Plovdiv, Bulgaria, Oct. 31 - Nov. 5
Galeria Noua, Bucharest, Romania, Dec. 6 - Jan. 14 2007
2007
Documentary Fortnight, MoMA, New York, Feb. 2 – March 2
2nd Moscow Biennial, March 1 – April 1
Kunstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin, March 22 – April 8
2nd Foto Festival, Kunsthalle Mannheim, Sept. 21 – Oct. 10
2nd Murder By Number International Film Festival,
Taiwan, Oct. 12 – 19
2008
Kunstverein Wiesbaden, March 1 – 31
Under Pain Of Death, Austrian Cultural Forum,
New York, Jan. 22 – May 17
Conference of Birds Gallery, Bangkok, August 2 - 23
More information
A discretionary last supper has been given to prisoners facing the death penalty as long as the punishment has existed. The tradition stems from funeral rites where the deceased person was given food on his deathbed to protect him on his journey to the afterlife. Today, the ritual of giving the last supper to the condemned person has been detached from its origin—it has become as anachronistic as the punishment it accompanies. The Last Supper focuses on this discrepancy between the historical “meaning” and contemporary use of a tradition that has lost its connection with the past.
The film mixes documentary material with sculptural installations and animated graphics. The main character is an American former death-row chef, Brian D. Price, who reconstructs one of the two hundred final meals that he prepared during his time as inmate at the Texas State Penitentiary at Huntsville. The macabre stories of his experiences from death row are woven together with practical tips on how to best cook a crappie, or as he calls it, “Last Wish Fish.”
Bigert & Bergström first began to consider the tradition of the last supper in 1994, when they came across a small article in a Swedish daily paper about the execution of the American serial killer John Wayne Gacy Jr. The short, dry text ended with the words: “He also chose, as is customary, his last meal: fried shrimp, grilled chicken, French fries, and strawberries for dessert.” This seemingly quotidian meal suddenly acquired a very different meaning when placed in relation to the lethal injection that killed Gacy hours later.
This small article initiated a nearly five-year-long research-and-development period, which led the duo to travel around the world searching for the origins of this paradoxical tradition. The film was shot in 2004 in the United States, the Philippines, Thailand, Japan, Kenya, South Africa, and Sweden.
