‘Bergman in Uganda’: Ugandan Veejays, Swedish Pirates, and the Political Value of Live Adaptation

Abstract

In early May 2014, the Swedish artist Markus Öhrn premiered the first part of his project ‘Bergman in Uganda’ at the Kunstenfestivaldesarts in Brussels, Belgium. The premiere involved a screening of Ingmar Bergman’s signature film Persona (1966), interpreted by a Ugandan ’veejay’ who goes by the name of Veejay HD. On two adjacent screens, Öhm presented viewers with Bergman’s film and Veejay HD’s face, as he translated the film into Luganda for Ugandan audiences, with Veejay HD’s words, in turn, translated into English subtitles. The festival blurb describes veejays as ‘a new kind of folk storyteller … people who work in makeshift cinema halls in slums and remote villages’ and who translate foreign films (mostly Hollywood blockbusters) for Ugandan audiences (Kunstenfestivaldesarts, 2014). It explains Öhrn’s motivation for initiating the ‘Bergman in Uganda’ project as one invested with irony, as a way of allowing ‘the European spectator to see how the African viewer looks at him’ and as a ‘confusing reversal that induces us to reflect on our own perspective’ (Kunstenfestivaldesarts, 2014).