Laura Leppert

Handful

2025 | Video | 12:57 min | FHD | 16:9 | stereo sound

Handful focuses on the canal waterways of the 'Speicherstadt' in Hamburg in northern Germany. 'Speicherstadt', literally ‚storage city‘, is the world‘s biggest storehouse complex, and sits at the sea-facing city limits next to the harbour. Here, all goods were stored for further sale - from early Hanse trading to colonial exploitation in the Americas. The network of waterways carried goods, stories, and ghosts from the world‘s shipping routes and trade networks. It is connected to the open sea and still has a tidal rhythm.

I set out to film the waterways via boat from high to low tide. We glide along the murky water, look at the patchworked, dripping canal walls and meet apparitions and ghosts. The journey is joined by a silent text - a hallucinatory journey of a sip of water through centuries, bodies and aggregate states, across continents and memories.

Studio view

Studio view as installation

Video stills