And this is what happened in Austria recently:
For days now it has been raining permanently night and day and snowing 100 m higher …
I am here in the wetlands haha part of a small family-like minifestival (called »Enchanted Garden«) giving a workshop. All was supposed to happen outside in the huge natural park called »Gesäuse« but all is now happening inside … feeling sorry for the festival but people are in a good mood (we’re talking about 15 people, not more, it’s really nice and tiny).
How can I translate »Gesäuse«? Something making a whispering sound like the running water of the river, of the falling rain, of the wind in the leaves …
We’re filming in a small group, just 6 people and me, developing in a soup of what nature gives us. Cheers!
You can see some results here on YouTube!
Schlagwort: workshop
Italia 9 – Workshop!
Oh Bocchigliero, you hot village in tropical Calabria! We were sweating like hell in this workshop … filming and making a unique developing soup that we called “Bocchiglierol” … successfully developed a film with it!!!
15 Meter Film In A Staircase
A mini workshop in Köln: developing one roll of super 8 Kodachrome in Caffenol, 32 people watching, joining, helping … and then we hung it to dry all the way down the staircase of the Kölner Filmhaus!
A Month Full Of Travelling, Workshops And Filming
Hello goodbye Hildesheim, Köln, Hamburg, Bremen!
June is over now and I am still dizzy.
1:1 Workshop
I had this experiment yesterday: a 1 on 1 workshop with an artist from the US (we’ve known each other via instagram), now in Europe, documentary film maker, who wanted to learn from me: caffenol / veggie soup developing, super 8 and double 8, tricks and recipes, how to set up a darkroom, which devices needed for developing and so much more!
It was fun, it was inspiration and knowledge … and now I think I will do it again. Offering different kinds of workshops, online and in reality, one person and more.
A regular date maybe (like every first Sunday of the month) via Zoom for little money: me answering all super 8 / eco developing questions, helping with current projects, showing how to mix a magic soup … like it?
Another Workshop Snippet Film
I love to do it … when one of my workshops is finished and all the footage has been digitized … making a short snippet film!
Here it is! Click on the image or here!!
A Table Full Of Cameras And Stuff
… this is all I need for a funky workshop!!!!!
Nirvana In Athena
I was in Athens! In Greece! I was invited for a filmshow and also asked to give a one day workshop. Of course I said yes (and extended my stay after Athens and jumped down to Crete for a 1 week holiday to catch the last summer sun beams!)
The event was a kind of festival called “Balkan-Can-Kino / Festival – 6th Symposium”: The 6th BCK Film Symposium is taking place in October 2023. This year’s theme is KINO LUDENS and through a series of screenings, artistic installations, workshops and parallel events, the Symposium will focus on the presence and the importance of the element of play in the multiple layers of adulthood and everyday life, showcasing interactivity in cinema, not necessarily through new technologies, but through the meaning of game/play in the creation of a cinematic work and its importance in every stage of the production.” This is their website.
However: my film show was great, the gallery packed, the audience happy!
And what about Nirvana?
Whenever I explore a new city, I am very interested in its public transport. Metro! Bus! Tram! I love it! I love to browse the map … and I always succeed in finding interesting station names (like “Pep Ventura” for example in Barcelona).
This time I found a bus stop called “Nirvana / Νιρβάνα”. Of course I had to go there! And start a new film!
Anthotypes On Giebichstein
What is a Giebichstein??
It’s an art school in Halle at river Saale in middle-east Germany.
I was invited there to give a short anthotypes workshop! Big room, not too many students not too close, all careful and … once I spread my enthusiasm: infected!!! By my enthusiasm ;-), by love for colours, for nature, veggie, flowers, experiments, squeezing vegetables, painting wildly … it was pure fun and inspiration!!
I See Double
… that was the name of my recent workshop. Filming with double super 8 cameras! And even more adventurous: creating double exposures!
We used fresh Czech FOMA films and old ORWOs.
Developed in Caffenol, classical poisonous black & white reversal stuff like potassium permanganate & sulfuric acid and a little less toxic and more experimental: peroxide and acetic acid. Yummy stuff and beautiful results!!!
Glück Auf!
2 Tage Workshop Zeche Zollverein Essen – 2 days workshop developing super 8 film using coffee, regional beer and flower tea.
Wow! That was a blast! Not only did we work, explore and play on one of the most interesting ex-industrial sites of Europe – the Zeche Zollverein – but also experimented successfully with local weed and beer to be transformed into film developer!
I was honored to be invited as a kind of side workshop within a travelling exhibition: „examples to follow! expeditions in aesthetic and sustainability“ that is distinguished by the German UNESCO Commission as Decade Project of the UN Decade in Education for Sustainable Development 2014.
They say: „We need visions of a sustainable life that interconnect with the sensuality, lust and passion of acting on our own. examples to follow! intends to encourage this and to move the cultural and aesthetic dimension of sustainability into the awareness of the senses, thus counteracting the visible erosion of the term. The exhibition aims at raising awareness for the fact that a constructive sustainability cannot make do without the arts and sciences. It needs to learn from them how to think in transitions, interim solutions, models, and projects.“
Read more here: http://z-n-e.info
13 participants and me … strolling around with our super 8 cameras, filming and then developing these films using a mix of coffee / beer (Stauder-Pils) / flower tea + vitamin c and washing soda. Using what we found, filming our surroundings. Embracing coincidence. And the results? Marvellous! Black & white negative films (being telecined right now to be published here and there).
Being on a coal mine / coking plant territory, admiring the gigantic industrial complex as well as the power of flower – nature taking over – history of coal miners and the lives they spent working like hell in a black and hot hell 1000 meters below the surface and above … using these flowers and their beer to develop „working man’s small format“ super 8 film … well somehow I felt enchanted!
More about the Zeche Zollverein, taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeche_Zollverein:
The Zollverein Coal Mine Industrial Complex (German Zeche Zollverein) is a large former industrial site in the city of Essen, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It has been inscribed into the UNESCO list of World Heritage Sites since December 14, 2001 and is one of the anchor points of the European Route of Industrial Heritage.
The first coal mine on the premises was founded in 1847, mining activities took place from 1851 until December 23, 1986. For decades starting in the late 1950s, the two parts of the site, Zollverein Coal Mine and Zollverein Coking Plant (erected 1957−1961, closed on June 30, 1993), ranked among the largest of their kinds in Europe. Shaft 12, built in Bauhaus style, was opened in 1932 and is considered an architectural and technical masterpiece, earning it a reputation as the “most beautiful coal mine in the world”
As with most sites of the heavy industries that had been closed down, Zollverein was predicted to face a period of decay. Surprisingly, the state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) bought the coal mine territory from the RAG immediately after it had been closed down in late 1986, and declared shaft 12 a heritage site. This went along with the obligation to preserve the site in its original state and to minimize the effects of weathering. In 1989, the city of Essen and NRW founded the Bauhütte Zollverein Schacht XII that should take care for the site and which was replaced by the Stiftung Zollverein (Zollverein Foundation) in 1998.
After it had been closed down in 1993, the coking plant was planned to be sold to China. The negotiations failed and it was subsequently threatened to be demolished. However, another project of the state of NRW set the coal mine on a list of future exhibition sites resulting in first gentle modifications and the cokery also became an official heritage site in 2000.
On its 25th session in December 2001, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) declared both the sites of the shafts 12 and 1/2 and the cokery a World Heritage Site.
Coffee Workshop In Hamburg
I was invited to give a workshop at Hamburg Kurzfilmfestival last week!
A group of seven filmed super 8 black&white and we developed in yummy soup made of coffee, vitamin c and washing soda. The weather was so hot that we puddled happily outside in the yard. The result: fun and a bunch of very beautiful black&white negatives!
Here’s a link to the group film >>> X.
Jacaranda Day
Today is my workshop day!
All is prepared …
We’ll develop films in coffee, red wine and probably in Jacaranda flower tea – press your thumbs that it will be fun and successfull!!
Wabisabi In Berlin Part 1!
Yeeha, the first Berlin-workshop is over (the second is in July and full).
7 people, 2 intense days full of filmish vibes, lucky developers, great ideas, infecting mood! It’s every time (this was only my 5th workshop so far) fascinating how people that have never met before can become very quickly like brothers and sisters in a boat! Thank you for being part of the wabisabi event, guys and chicas!!
This is Nadine hanging in a tree, Cécile despiralizing the freshly developed film from the spiral and Florian hanging 15 m of still wet film through the dark room while we were watching some films on the beamer.
Film on!
The Dresden Feeling
Wabisabi #4!
I held my fourth film workshop – at the Schmalfilmtage Dresden, one of the best short film festivals on earth (8 and 16 mm)! All about the power and beauty and techniques and tricks of Double Super 8 and black&white negative processing. The 8-members-gang was cool and enthusiastic, produced meters and meters of (partly double exposed) great film! Go to www.wabisabisuper8.com and find out more soon
This is Marie and Karin writing names in the deep frozen snow:
[and thank you thank you thank you dear festival jury for the prize for my film, yippieh!!! May nightlight shine lovely on you ;-]
Oh yes and by the way: I spent 3 nights in my favourite Hotel called Raskolnikoff which I can definitely recommend if you’re ever looking for a lovely spot to stay. In Dresden-Neustadt, not expensive at all, kitchen for free use, only 3 or 4 rooms, beautiful pictures hanging in them.
I felt well protected by the insect man!!
Cambridge Super 8 Wabisabi Workshop 1
I’m in a hurry and in a blurry wonderful experimental mood!
This one turns out to be one of the best warmest film festivals in the world …
…. and here come some first photos of my Wabi-Sabi workshop (yesterday and today) – so intense and so fun and successful (in terms of films that we processed today: 10! Ekta 64T with Tetenal Reversal Kit E6! God! Beee-yooooou-ti-fullll!!!)
Here’s Julie performing the ultimate Russian Tank Spiral Ballet:
This is our group film hanging in Colins workshop space:
This is the Wabi-Sabi group sunken in Cambridge’s Green:
… and this is Jean, holding the magical tank direction heaven 🙂
……. to be continued ……
Dresden Experimental Filmworkshop
That was great! I guided two intense workshop days during the Schmalfilmtage-Film-Festival: „The Lucky 7 film ORWO 8“ – Seven participants (from Leipzig and Dresden) had the rare opportunity to work with ORWO film material. Double Super 8. Old wind up cameras. Film rolls that have lingered for 20 years or more in the fridge and waited
The results were extremely beautiful: we got the famous „ORWO worms“ – a unique worm-like pattern on the film – the gelatine layers break during processing. My students were a bunch of enthusiastic girls and guys – thank you for being part of my Wabisabi workshop, writing names in the snow, playing with coincidences and having a wonderful time!
Inside the Dresden train station I discovered a kiosk with sausages hanging in the open windows. „Blasenwurst„, I never heard of that before. Can it really mean what it says?? I mean … Blase means Bladder … mmh!
Back in Berlin my brother picked me up and we went to Kreuzbergs best Italian Restaurant (I mentioned it earlier) – pulsating, noisy, crowded as usual, we had gigantic yummy Pizza and there was a partying laughing simpatico large group of Americans at the neighbor table – one of the best film makers and his crew, these days working at his new project – welcome in Berlin, QT! We captured his back through my prosecco glass 😉
What a wonderful fulfilling weekend!
Workshop Last Day
Mission possible. More Super 8 makers & lovers!
Thanks Tsveta, Hans, Nick, Mathijs, Mariska, Britt, Judith, Matt, you were great!
To be continued …
This is Mathijs dumping an underwater camera and attracting ducks!!!!! Which was by the way a totally hard job because they somehow were afraid of the camera and instinctively felt it … We had to throw a lot of bread pieces (btw nederlandse supermarket bread is incredibly soft and sandwichfriendly but that is another story) and when the seagulls communicated that the area was safe then the ducks came … slooooowly ….
Filming needs patience but it’s always worth it.
This is Mariska and Britt checking a freshly processed color Ekta film!!
Rotterdam Worm Workshop Day 3
Wow, that was an intense day 😉
Filming paperships, swans from underwater, burning tea-saucers, sofa patterns, bridges, workers, seagulls. And it was also a darkroom day, spiraling film into Russian tanks, diving in chemicals, the magic moment when a film sees for the first time the projector light: blurring night lights (the magic B!!), snow traces, backwards walking sign-seekers, living trousers, subway lights, scary lamps … and more.
To be continued!
Rotterdam Workshop Day 1
Yesterday it started to storm really heavily and today it was all fresh and cold and we had an amazing light outside, very melodramatic. Perfect for the first day of Wabi-Sabi-Filming!
My students are cool, the place is great, the weather plays with us, the first black+white processing made the first group film a masterpiece! More to follow. Tomorrow we will have some outdoor experiments, challenge coincidence to take us on a trip through Rotterdam. I’ll be back!!!
Super 8 Workshop Day 4
Group animation in Echo Park!
Super 8 Workshop Day 2
Whow!
Today was Animation Day!
(sorry for the out of focus picture above … my cellphone camera got too hot I guess 😉 /// we transformed the filmcenter into an animation center: 2 tables covered with moving things like fruit, lighting ducks, burning candles, bread, words written on paper … my students did a crazy good job animating, bringing objects to life! I’m proud of them.