Ethnologist, anthropologist, film maker, book author
In January of last year, we lost our longtime colleague Barbara Lüem forever. Her fatal accident has left a gaping hole in our team that no one can be expected fill.
Barbara helped guide the film forum beginning with its second incarnation in 1987 and filled many roles in the years since. She was an expert ethnologist, a cinephile, and a friend. Barbara was also our resident visual anthropologist. It was her gift to remain focused on the ethno graphic perspective without losing sight of film history or aesthetics.
Barbara’s life was deeply influenced by her commitment to pursue knowledge beyond the walls of academia. She conducted much of her research in the field, whether as a stand keeper at Basel’s outdoor market, or in her quest to find Saint Barbara (sic!) beneath the mines of the Gotthard tunnel, or as a member of the Swiss sailor choir “Störtebekers”. Her book “Heimathafen Basel” (Home Port Basel, 2003), impressively documenting the history and culture of Swiss seafaring extending from the Rhine to the high seas, garnered attention far beyond Switzerland.
Her own travels frequently took her to the island of Tuvalu in the Pacific Ocean. We can likely surmise the kind of sensibility that informed Barbara’s approach to her ethnological research on the island from the fact that a native family saw fit to adopt her. Indeed, she had an enduring fascination with the seas and their shores. Ten years ago, we jointly conceived and featured a film series devoted entirely to the sea and coastal life. In her introduction to the program, Barbara wrote: “The seas, lakes, and oceans – what would they be without the coasts, cliffs, and shores? These landscapes give the bodies of water their borders, yet also reveal their seeming limitlessness.”
What better way to honor Babara at this year’s festival than with a film that she surely would have enjoyed seeing again, 10 years after we originally presented it? The referen ce is to Johan van der Keuken’s THE FLAT JUNGLE – a film that, as expressed by the title of that year’s program, depicts “neither solely water, nor entirely land”.
With our eyes set on the film forum programs we have featured over the last 20 years, and the stories behind their creation whispering in our ears, we bid a final heart felt farewell to Barbara. We wish to thank her from the bottom of our hearts for her years of dedication, and we hope sincerely – in a sentiment likely shared by forum guests from all over the world – that the freiburg film forum and Barbara Lüem’s name will remain forever closely linked.
Neriman Bayram, Werner Kobe, Mike Schlömer and the team of the Kommunales Kino