"Aurand’s first film, Schweigend ins Gespräch vertieft (Deeply Absorbed in Silent Conversation, 1980), establishes the intimacy of her style even as it creates a quiet interiority that disappears from her more celebratory later work. From its opening title, a reverse title card that flips to the correct reading, the film is about mirrors and reflections. The central character walks out of her front door and looks down at her reflection in a puddle on the street. Her subjectivity is constantly revealed in her surroundings. Her cast shadow and reflection appear along the cobblestones, on the hood of a car, in mirrors, in mylar that is ripped apart and a puddle that drains before our eyes. In this remarkably direct film, she permutates a series of possible reflective moments, attempting to see herself more clearly as she reveals herself to us.
The remarkable central scene, shot in a swimming pool, locates the double physically in the body of another. A nude swimmer, who initially swims just below the surface of the water—finding her reflection above rather than below—is joined by another swimmer who replaces that reflection with her own body. The aching distance of the mirror is replaced by the physical caress of proximity, beautifully aided by a tactile underwater choreography. Surface of water becomes surface of skin.
After than brief moment of reverie, we return to the single subject, again alone in silent thought. The image is revealed to be a reflection in a train window, darkened by a tunnel, which gives way to the rushing scenery outside. In the film’s final action, the woman stands up and opens the window, looking beyond her reflection at the city passing by. This act announces a recognition of the world beyond the self. In effect, it is a launching point for the artist herself. The young woman absorbing the view passing speedily by the window foreshadows the restless eye of engagement that will so actively mark Aurand’s evolving visual style. (…)"
Chris Kennedy, 2009, In Present Tense: Films of Ute Aurand