Location: Büro Friedrich, Berlin - October 2001
This video installation is based on the true story of the twins June and Jennifer Gibbons and their war of silence. The sisters were engaged in a constant power struggle, competing desperately to assert their own personalities. At the same time, they were haunted by the fear of separation. Their tragedy was their inability to live with and without each other. They retreated into a world of their own making, excluding everyone else, speaking only to one another, and venting their anger against the world: us against them.
In this two-hour film, L.A.Raeven portray the lives of June and Jennifer Gibbons, drawing on Marjorie Wallace’s book The Silent Twins (1986) and using fragments of the TV documentary of the same name directed by Jon Amiel. Also heard is the song “Tsunami” by the Manic Street Preachers, which was based on the story of the “Silent Twins.”
This installation is made possible by the Mondriaan Fonds