Maite Alberdi: La Once (Tea Time), 2014

Maite Alberdi
(La Tercera)
no copyright infringement intended

Is the universe of Maite Alberdi also the one of ours, or a world of herself, with other geometry and other rules of logic? At the beginning it seems that's our known universe, however something is weird, and calls in mind the non-Euclidian. Says she, estoy obsesionada con lo insólito de la realidad (I am obsessed with the insolite of reality), which means it is our world, only she has the craft to discover the non-Euclidian here, in our day-to-day geometry.

Sometimes this non-Euclidian means just kindness and empathy, like in La Once (Tea Time): five ladies meet each month around the tea, in a ritual that's taking place for sixty years. Each time they repeat the same small stories, kind memories of a time bygone; they repeat the same small stories each time, in almost the same words, and the others listen without interrupting, because these small stories, like the cups of tea and the cakes, and like themselves, are part of the same ritual of a time bygone.

La Once, 2014 (fragment)
(video via NY Times)

Documental centrado en cinco mujeres de avanzada edad, quienes desde hace 60 años, sagradamente, se juntan a tomar el té una vez al mes. En estas reuniones se encuentran y desencuentran, interpretan y comentan la actualidad -incluso aunque no entiendan algunas tendencias-, evocan el pasado común y se esfuerzan en demostrar que aún están vigentes, olvidando por un momento los males que padecen.



(Maite Alberdi)