Rocky tales of occupation

"Rocky tales” is a slide show of underground images made in the Jesuit caves in Maastricht, the Netherlands. Here, scholastics and missionaries came together to paint and sculpt the walls during the 19th and 20th century. The Jesuits’ works were often inspired by their colonial journeys. They were also influenced by the German occupation of the caves during the second world war and the NATO’s secret presence afterwards. The murals are a fascinating time document: a mix of copied historical sites and monuments, drawings from popular imagery and texts from all over the world, strewn over the galleries in random order. Ramses II neighbours Peter Pan and Shakespeare; Confucius flanks John F. Kennedy while the Alhambra Palace stands next to the Jesuits’ cafeteria. Lagarde’s video presents itself as a guided tour, with an authoritative voice-over blending the histories of the Jesuit copies and the authentic artifacts. The text indiscriminately draws from a variety of sources: wikipedia pages, newspaper articles, Jesuit diaries and tripadvisor reviews. The result is a disorientating mix of political opinion, nostalgia, religious belief and popular culture. Similar to the mnemonic “memory palace” of the Ancient Greeks, "Rocky tales" creates an artificial memory; a parallel history shaped by the appropriation of territories, cultures and symbols.