“Passage” begins with an alluring drum beat—the type of sound that conjures something magical. The film by Solange Knowles, directed by Wu-Tsang and styled by Ib Kamara, is a celebration of the finalists for this year’s International Woolmark Prize: Bethany Williams, Casablanca, Kenneth Ize, LECAVALIER, Matty Bovan, and Thebe Magugu. One of these designers will take home the grand prize, whose previous winners include Valentino Garavani, Karl Lagerfeld, and Yves Saint Laurent.
But for now, they are all part of the celebration in “Passage,” which features the work of all six designers. As the film’s journey begins, subtle movement entrances you while you embark on a conceptual voyage leaving one world and seamlessly falling into another. A ring of eclectic dance emerges first with hands held and then bodies freed, reminiscent of Mattisse’ The Dance, an abstraction of struggle, freedom, and joy. As the camera guides us through an imagined realm where the clothes have autonomy, we are swept from the stage to the forest to a surrealist melding of the two worlds. The forest—perhaps an allegory for sustainability—and the theater come together to create a world of shadows and shapes, as the stages of creation are explored with each designer’s creative expression as the muse.
“In continuing Saint Heron’s world making practice, ‘Passage’ further explores my interest in theatrical production through the translation of identity, spirit, philosophy and creation,” Solange said in a statement. “Whether it be through album artwork, stage design, or filmmaking, I’ve always sought to create new visual languages that encompass the expressions my other works cannot communicate.”
After quick flashes of a beautiful but eerily vacant theatre, the film ends with the same drummer that brought us here; somehow we leave this passage transformed. As Marcel Proust once wrote, “The real voyage of discovery consists, not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.”
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