Two Minutes To Midnight, 2021
One channel video and sound installation, 47 min.
“What if women ruled the world?” Yael Bartana stages the question in her performative ‘Two Minutes to Midnight,’, where an all women government of a fictitious country must take a stand on an imminent nuclear threat from a foreign nation. A panel of fictional characters and real women experts in fields such as defence, law, politics and psychology is set in a democratic ‘Peace Room’, mirroring the toxically masculine ‘War Room’ in Stanley Kubrick’s classic Cold War satire, ‘Dr. Strangelove.’ The women are tasked with deciding how to approach the prescripted situation. Bartana’s visionary work is the synthesis of an interdisciplinary four-year process that analyses the geopolitical power game – and presents us with an alternative to the macho power discourse.
The footage emerged from the recordings of the hybrid-experimental live performance What if Women Ruled the World? in Aarhus and Berlin (2017 and 2018) And the performance “Bury Our Weapons not Our Bodies” (Philadelphia 2019).
A film by Yael Bartana
The footage emerged from the recordings of the live performance
What if Women Ruled the World? in Aarhus and Berlin (2017 and 2018 ).
Producers
Yael Bartana
Naama Pyritz
Executive Producer live performance
Jo Paton
Associate Director live performance
Camilla Nielsson
Co-Producer Germany
Zsuzsanna Kiràly
Post Production Producer
Anja Lindner
Director of Photography
Uri Ackerman
Editor
Yael Bartana
Sound Design
Daniel Meir
Cinematographers
Sophie Winqvist
Agnesh Pakozdi
Matan Radin
Claudia Schröder
Additional Editors
Ayelet Gil
Michal Oppenheim
Daphna Keenan
Bobby Good
Walter Solon
Janina Herhoffer
Lian Rotem
Story Consultants
Itamar Gov
Mille Haynes
Dialogue Editor
Yasmin Vardi
Color Grading
Simon Veroneg
Graphic Design
Avi Bohbot
Titles Animator
Inbar Vahab-Kranz
Subtitles & Translation
Christina Gauglitz
Carrie C. Roseland
Camera Equipment Rental
Redrental, Aarhus
tectum, Berlin
Commissioning Editor, RBB/ARTE
Dagmar Mielke
Project accountant
Jolanka Höhn
Music
Vera Lynn “We’ll Meet Again” – ℗ 1953 – Decca, Courtesy of Universal Music GmbH
Words & Music by Ross Parker & Gugh Charles
© Dash Music Co. Ltd./Campbell Connelly and Co. Ltd.
With courtesy of Bosworth Music GmbH.
What if Women Ruled the World? (2017-2018) was commissioned and produced as a live project by Manchester International Festival, European Capital of Culture Aarhus 2017 and Volksbühne Berlin.
Executive Producer
Jo Paton
Actors Director in Manchester
Vicky Featherstone
Associate Director in Aarhus and Berlin
Camilla Nielsson
Writer for Manchester
Abi Morgan
Co-writer for Aarhus and Berlin
Alex Barrett
Curatorial Associate
Phoebe Greenwood
Consultant and development
Galit Eilat
Dr. Noa Shuval
Technical Director
Jack Thompson
Commissioning Coordinator
Hannah Falvey
Set Design
Saygel & Schreiber
Production Manager
Sam Collins
Sound Design
Daniel Meir
Assistant Producer
Hannah Clapham Clark
Company Manager
Louise Martin
Assistant Stage Manager
Clare Louise Heath
Wardrobe Supervisor
Shanti Freed
Graphic Design
Avi Bohbot
Gila Kaplan
Still Photographer
Birgit Kaulfuss
Studio Yael Bartana
Itamar Gov
Esper Postma
Saskia Wendland
Special thanks to
John McGrath, Juliana Engberg, Marietta Piekenbrock, Jacqui Davies
Nadia Albini, Natasha Gordon, Susanne Sachsse, Danusia Samal, Eileen Walsh
Galit Eilat, Susan George, Natasha Gordon, Nancy Hollander,
Leyla Hussein, Lina Khatib, Holly Kilroy, Dr. Marion Koopmans, Dr. Patricia M Lewis, Kasha Jacqueline Nabagesera
Frances Raday, Kate Raworth, Anni Helena Routsala,
Shogofa Sahar, Sharon Squassoni, Natasha Walter, Mariam Ibrahim Yusuf
Milli Bhatia, Stephanie Hardt, Ido Karilla, Pedro Maia, Anne Misselwitz, Jackie Shemesh
Emil Uriel Bartana, Saskia Wendland
With thanks to
Amna Abdullatif, Kathryn Abel, Hassan Akkad, Naomi Alderman, Shalni Arora, Claudia Aradau, Nisha Ayub, Amanda Bamford, Trine Bang, Wendy Barclay, Emil Uriel Bartana, Rebecca Bennett, Nancy Berman, Erica Bolton, Chiara Bottici, Pola Bousiou, Connie Butler, Judith Butler, Christine Byriel Andersen, Ayse Cavdar, Christine Cort, Chipo Chung, Diane Coyle, Jacqui Davies, Dilar Dirik, Philippa England, Mary Evans, Mel Evans, Sarah Faulkner, Marianna Fotaki, Jade French, Fiona Gasper, Heide Goettner-Abendroth, Shelley Harten, Gil Hochberg, Kelly Hotten, Ruth Ibegbuna, Sally Jones, Naomi Klein, Chloe Lamford, Philippa Lei, Naomi Mabita, Ruth Mackenzie, Sarah Mander, Charlotte Mann, Evie Manning, Helen McFarlane, Dagmar Mielke, Cristina Mittermeier, Oren Moverman, Gemma Mortensen, Kavyasiddhi Mulvey, Dee Dee Myers, Kirsten Niehuus, Sarah Niles, Yuli Novak, Kobi Ovadia, Deborah Orr, Safak Pavey, Lucy Pearson, Nina Power, Gill Powell, Vicky Pryce, Jane Quinn, Jessica Raine, Gabrielle Rifkind, Françoise von Roy, Dame Nancy Rothwell, Sheila Rowbotham, Baroness Royall of Blaisdon, Antonia Salib, Livnat Sela, Stav Shaffir, Kamila Shamsie, Juma Sharkah, Emma Sky, Annie Sprinkle, Lynne Stafford, Gloria Steinem, Kate Stone, Martine Taube, Gaetana Trippetti, Simone Turchetti, Teresa Hoefert de Turégano, Ruth Turner, Ruth Ur, Francesca Waite, Sophie Walker, Gabriele Walsh, Anoushka Warden, Yusra Warsama, Sheila Watt-Cloutier, Saskia Wendland, Ellen West, Janine Weston, Judith Wilson, Isabel Adomakoh Young, Hillit Zwick, Annet Gelink Gallery, Sommer Contemporary Art, Galleria Raffaella Cortese, Petzel Gallery, Capitain Petzel Gallery, HSL, Keyteq, Splinter Scenery, Star Events, Tube UK, UK Rigging, White Light, Bruntwood, Civic Engineers, Electricity North West, Graham Construction, Selfridges & Co.
Camilla Nielsson
Additional footage was shot during the live performance Bury Our Weapons, Not Our Bodies in Philadelphia in 2018.
The performance was curated and organised by Amanda Sroka, Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art at the Philadelphia Museum of Art
Director
Yael Bartana
Producer
Naama Pyritz
Director of Photography
Itai Neeman
Second Unit Director of Photography
Mick van Rossum
Choreographers
Ruti Sela and Mor Bashan
from the Noa Eshkol Chamber Dance Group
Costume Designer
Yael Shenberger
Art Director
Shmuel Ben Shalom
Master of Ceremony
Olwen Fouéré
The Undertakers
Jennifer Abrevaya, Benjamin Behrend, Lesley Berkowitz, Julianna Boylan, Daniella Brown, Erin Carney, Taylor Cawley, Sebastian Cummings, Angie Fennell, Adrianna Jimenez Gonzalez, Dana Herbert, Anita Holland, Leah Holleran, Briannon Holstein, Matthew John Janis, Jung-eun Kim, Amalia Wiatr Lewis, Jacqueline Rose Libby, Emma Manion, Jaime Maseda, Kayla Simone McGill, Kevin Meehan, Rhonda Moore, Sarah Muehlbauer, Mphoentle Ndaba, Chloe Marie Newton, Hillary Pearson, Paige Phillips, Vitche-Boul Ra, Gabrielle Revlock, Matthew Rios, Roberto Rodriguez-Garcia, Nia Simmons, Andrew Smith, Margot Steinberg, Katherine Sullivan, Dwayne Townsend, Haylee Warner, Sarah Warren, and Emily White
Choreographers
Ruti Sela and Mor Bashan from the Noa Eshkol Chamber Dance Group
Performance Production Coordinator
Chelsea Sanz
Two Minutes to Midnight is produced with the support of
Mondriaan Fund, Amsterdam
RBB/ARTE
Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg
The Philip and Muriel Berman Foundation
Hammer Museum, LA
Ingenue Production
© Yael Bartana, MY-I Productions