documentary filmmaker / researcher
lecturer in film & media practice at the University of Kent
PhD student in Film: Practice as Research
based in London / Prague
JUST FINISHED: ANOTHER SUMMER
A feature documentary film about Afghan and Ukrainian refugees in Europe that I co-directed and co-edited with David Edwards.
How do you make a home when you’ve lost your home? What future can you have when your past has been stripped away?
What is left when what was yours has been stolen or destroyed?
To address these questions, the directors of Another Summer provided training and equipment to a group of Afghan and Ukrainian first-time filmmakers who had taken refuge in different European countries after the Taliban takeover in 2021 and the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Following a week together learning about filmmaking and each other, the student filmmakers were divided into teams and sent to seven cities in Europe and Turkey to record the stories of people like themselves who had fled violence and repression. What they brought back demonstrates something different than the usual cameraman/subject relationship at the heart of most documentary filmmaking. Throughout, one senses the bonds of people who recognize in each other both what they have lost and the humanity they refuse to give up.
More details can be found on our website: https://www.chronicle-film.com/
CURRENT PROJECT: A DYING FOX TURNS ITS HEAD TO HOME
Since 2019, I have been working on my PhD research project focused on the meaning of home in London.
It's an in-depth exploration of the topic with two outcomes – a feature documentary film and a thesis.
Documentary
film
Anthropology
The film explores and tells the story of five Londoners and gradually uncovers in depth what home means to them not only today but throughout their lives. Together with them, I, the director of the film, continuously explore my home as well as throughout the filmmaking process, I question what it means to live in London. The entire film is thus a visit to several homes – theirs and mine, abstract and concrete, temporary and permanent, real and dreamed, private and public. Each character is in a different situation, yet they are all at home in London. Jamaican Andre, British Caroline, Russian Zinovy, French Emilie, Irish-Ukrainian Maria. The film accompanies us through the process of getting to know their home and changes its form and narrative style along with how we get closer to them – emotionally and physically. The film and its chosen form reflect not only the pandemic situation, in which the importance of the home has been significantly accentuated, but also views the home as a universal, omnipresent, very personal, and individual theme. It passes from virtual space to reality, from public to inner, and from observational documentary to autoethnography. How can one have a home in London?
DOP: Fraser Stephen
STAGE: Postproduction
The (unfinished) project was presented at:
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Czechoslovak Society of Arts and Sciences meeting in London (February 2024)
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RAI (Royal Anthropology Institute) Film Festival Work In Progress session (March 2023)
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Anthropology of Home course by UCL & Open City Documentary Festival (Autumn 2022 & Spring 2023) led by Dr Barbara Knorpp
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Good City Conference on Urbanism at the Kent School of Architecture (October 2022)
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Connections PGR SOA Conference at the University of Kent (June 2022)
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NonConference – PGR SOA event at the University of Kent (June 2021)
The creation of the project was supported by:
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Vice Chancellor Scholarship at the University of Kent
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Migration and Movement Fund
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Arts & Humanities PG Research Fund
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Research Training Support Grant (through UKRI – UK Research and Innovation)
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GRC PhD Top-Up Fund
