Anselm Franke

A film based on a mock trial staged at an art fair in Madrid in February 2007 organized by Anton Vidokle and Tirdad Zolghadr. It playfully raises a number of polemical issues in the world of contemporary art: collusion with the "new bourgeoisie," instrumentalization of art and its institutions, the future possibility of artistic agency, as well as other pertinent topics.

SOAP manipulates the language of cinema and soap operas, accompanying a group of left-wingers’ attempt to infiltrate right- wing social networks. The tactic chosen by the group, composed of intellectuals and cultural agents, is the creation of a telenovela that would convey subversive messages in the apparently conservative form of the religious cultural product.

A Film Essay by Anselm Franke & Erhard Schüttpelz