Imagine you are an archaeologist and want to dig a site. You come upon a high hill rising from the wind-swept plains of Northern Syria. On the slope and saddle, there is a meadow, with a rock here and there. You pick up sherds, fragments of pottery: they tell an unexpected tale. Detective that you feel (as all archaeologists are supposed to be), you think there is here, slumbering under the slopes of the tell, an ancient capital, the mythical city of Urkesh. Instict is one thing, but professional archaeology is another. And you are a professional. Your goal is to dig to see what truth the ground may hold. The adventure just traced is not a movie plot. It is the real-life story of an archaeological team of Giorgio Buccellati and Marilyn Kelly-Buccellati. They came upon a hill and turned it into a city. And in so doing, they did prove their hunch. In “Unwrapping Urkesh” they tell their story, showing the splendour of their humble fragments from the earth, and communicating at the same time the feeling that goes into working professionally as archaeologists. Award-winning director Rick Hauser infuses poetry into the “dirty-science” of archaeology, and leads you into a new experience –“unwrapping” an archaeological site from its shroud of dirt, engaging you in the bold and humbling task of recovering a long since forgotten, yet vital fragment of our common past.
- Direction: RICK HAUSER
- Production: TSI – TELEVISIONE SVIZZERA
