Tobacco Shed

Tobacco Shed is a record of the facades of a large agricultural building, housing tobacco-curing ovens. The near-uniform framing, and the relationship of the shots to each other, is determined by the regular forms of the building, and by the intention that the film be a complete record of the building’s outer surfaces.

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The sound is a single continuous recording made inside the shed from a fixed position. Thus a contrasting relationship between outside and inside is established through a corresponding relationship between image and sound, in such a way that the intrinsic contrast between these two modalities is emphasised .

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The film was shot in Spedalicchio , a small hamlet in rural northwest Umbria, central Italy. In 2012 the subsidies given to tobacco producers in the European Union (293 million Euros in 2008) will end, and buildings like this will either be converted to other uses or fall into disrepair, as farmers move into alternative crop production.