Sisters in the Sky – the original from 1999 was 4 x 29 minutes here you can watch the Hero Remix it’s 30 minutes and in 4 parts. – by Simone Aaberg Kærn and Stine Kirstein. Produced by DR-TV/ Zentropa. This part is the beginning of the special cut -This version: Sisters hero remix is only 30 minutes. The original Sisters in the Sky was 4 x 29 minutes public service TV produced for the Danish Broadcast Corporation and Zentropa. Simone Aaberg Kærn, in the early 1990s, began working with projects relating to surveillance and control. This, however, soon turned into a fascination for the unreachable and impossible task of floating: flying in the space. Through animated flying videos, such as Air (1994), wanna fly (1995), and Royal Greenland (196), Simone Aaberg Kærn investigated and soon found a symbolic free space in the air. At first, it was animated spaces, in which she flew across the skies of Copenhagen, New York and Greenland seeking the limits of gravity and individual unassisted human flight. Soon after Simone Aaberg Kærn achieved her own flight certificate in order to produce the work, Sisters in the Sky. This was demanded by Anne Noggle, one of the female pilots, who also was portrayed in the work Sisters in the Sky (1997). Simone Aaberg Kærn’s painted portraits of female fighter pilots from Second World War was shown at and acquired by Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebæk. Sisters in the Sky is an impressive aesthetic and intellectual peephole of how women at that time could realize their dream of flying in a time of hardship. In the painting and sound installation, Simone Aaberg Kærn narrated their stories with a poetic, political and feministic gesture and introduced the...
FIGHTING for a LIVING
Afghanistan
8 min. documentary made for the Danish Foreign Ministery/ DANIDA by SImone Aaberg Kærn and UMANO films. The story of Latifa and her sister Lailuma fight for becomming fighter pilots. It’s a short documentary about the tuff reality in Afghanistan and about how strong women deal with life. Footage shot in Afghanistan 2003 and 2009 by SImone Aaberg Kærn also private recordings by Latifa Nabizada and family....
smiling in a war zone
The movie
As an artist Simone has always been obsessed with female fighter pilots. These old ladies challenged her to become a pilot. She succeeded and so became one of the ‘Sisters in the Sky’, now she hopes Farial will join. She decides to look for a plane and buys the only one she can afford: a 40-year old ‘Donald Duck’ Piper-Colt made out of canvas.
Simone: “hings do look different from above, it becomes easier to navigate in life, when you have seen the larger picture.” She also states that, “since 9/11 the skies are occupied and they should again be liberated and free.”
On the way she visits an adventurous female fighter pilot squadron in Turkey seeking top tuned helpers for her mission. But problems loom: her tiny plane can fly only for 3 hours on a full tank and according to the manual it will never fly high enough to cross the Afghan mountains. Bosnia and Iran reject her request to fly over their countries and the Pentagon says that Afghanistan is a war zone and not open for pleasure flights.
After challenging every military authority she comes across, weeks of travelling, 50 hours in the air, 33 landings, and in the end, flying illegally into Afghanistan at nerve wrecking heights, Simone finally reaches Kabul and finds Farial. To Afghani standard she is a modern English speaking girl. Simone even manages to take Farial into the sky, but then there is the harsh landing into the reality of the 1000 year old Afghan family clan-society.
SISTERS IN THE SKY
the documentary
Sisters in the sky – en roadmovie fra luften, TV dokumentary 4 x 28:30′ by Simone Aaberg Kærn og Stine Kirstein DR/Zentropa produktions 1998 – 1999
Two Danish girls fly across America in a tiny airplane (the size of a phonebooth) to rendezvous with four American women who served as Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP) in World War II.
Production Co: Zentropa Entertainments