Venice Architecture Film Festival 2022 Program
September 1st to 3rd 2022
at San Servolo Island – Venice

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“With the disappearance of a mainstream & therefore of an avant-garde in the arts, it has been noticed that all the more advanced & intense art-experiences have been recuperable almost instantly by the media, & thus are rendered into trash like all other trash in the ghostly world of commodities.” Hakim Bey, Immediatism, 1994.
The progressive dematerialization of the infrastructure that enables the satisfaction of individuals' desires leads to a random aggregation of individuals. The concept of the city as a functional organism for production and the lives of workers-consumers-citizens loses its meaning, reflected in the granularization of information and the gathering of consensus around ephemeral and insubstantial ideal nuclei. If at one time we imagined (and realized) escape from the malaise of urban life with the confinement in enclaves of subjects selected on the basis of census, today it seems more realistic to us to imagine an immaterial society in which everyone, regardless of census, will be able to decide to aggregate, quickly and autonomously with those who, like him, seek the satisfaction of a specific desire, without this requiring physical proximity. We imagine a zoning of desires that occurs spontaneously and transiently, each person having the extreme freedom to change and choose the form and place of residence by virtue of the guarantee of access to consumption and information.
The concept of citizenship income, contextualized with the spread of granular information media, the commercial dominance of online distribution, can help us understand the possibility of the concentration in the hands of a few individuals of the entire economic system,
conversely, the exclusion of the individual from the productive system and its downgrading to a producer of desires and consumerism. We have to note the extreme cultural, ethnic, and ideological diversity of those who have access to consumption and information without having to move, have no ties of ownership, neighborhood, or familiarity with the place they live. Dormitory neighborhoods are half rented to people who will not spend their entire lives there, the other half are available for tourist rental, or are vacant. Historic centers ditto. The randomness of work and its dematerialization induces mobility and thwarts the conventional city planning. The home no longer has its symbolic value.
People look for their "inhabitat" as a basic functional device to fulfill few concrete functions, and choose tiktok to live and realize their identity, their faith, their hopes and their desires. The competition will reward films that can depict the social, urban and (perhaps) architectural phenomena briefly imagined here.
Neighbors no longer exist, affinities are sought in social media, crystallizing one's opinions based on personal and transient choices, choosing from the daily-me catalog. The citizen is turned into an information-desire nucleus, no longer chasing a precise dwelling requirement rather the ephemeral and immediate satisfaction of desires.

key concepts:

  • disintegration of society and increase of individualism
  • privileging of personal desires and interests
  • impotence of planning
  • the house is no longer the point of arrival but an infrastructure for mobility and ephemeral aggregation
  • the neighborhood is no longer a functional unit organic to the city as a productive organism
  • Identification of new desires and needs that lead to community aggregation.
  • TAZ Temporarily Autonomous Zones (as a general reference but in a degraded sense)
  • transfiguration of places

2022 program - Day by Day

Thursday
September 1st

Screenings from 21:00

Venice Architecture Film Festival Competition: InHabitats

09:00 pm:  Engelen, 23 augustus – 5th qualified short film
By André Schreuders, Netherlands, 00:14:00

Situated in the suburbs of Den Bosch, the Netherlands, Engelen 23 augustus explores the felt implications of postmodern urban design. Is it desirable to design places which are highly functional, comfortable, stylised, controlled and isolated? Does this urban landscape mirror who we are? Inspired by 'Spheres' of Peter Sloterdijk.

09:15 pm:  Exterior Day (Esterno giorno) – 4th qualified short film
By Giulia Magno, Italy, 00:08:00

Inspired by a famous exchange of letters between Michelangelo Antonioni and Mark Rothko, “Esterno giorno” is an experimental love letter to Italian cinema.
Following in the footsteps of the characters played by Monica Vitti, the film retraces the geography of Antonioni’s vision, pushing the boundaries between subject and landscape, fiction and reality. From the metaphysical squares of Rome’s EUR district to the smokestacks of industrial Ravenna, from the red desert of Wadi Rum to the pink granite cliffs surrounding La Cupola—the futuristic house in Sardinia designed by the avant-garde architect Dante Bini in the 1960s for Antonioni and Vitti, then real-life partners—, the physical spaces explored by the camera become psychological landscapes, states of mind, atmospheres.
The filmmaker poetically intertwines contemporary footage shot in Italy and Jordan with archival materials and excerpts from “Eclipse” (1962) and “Red Desert” (1964), creating an illusion of continuity between past and present.
In collaboration with Archivio Michelangelo Antonioni.

ArchiTuned Selection

09:30 pm: Lower Grand
By Jeff Dorer, USA 2020. 10'.12''

The secret life of a street known from movies, television shows and commercials. Lower Grand chronicles the uneven recovery after the Great Recession through the aspect of this familiar setting. Depending which side you're on, its portals are a window on the upper crust of American society or its lower depths.

09:45 pm: The Automat
By Lisa Hurwitz, USA 2021. 79'.00''

Iconic, elegant, and populist all at once: the Automat (aka Horn & Hardart) revolutionized American dining a century ago, long before there was fast food or hipster coffee shops. An eclectic mix of New Yorkers inserted nickels into slots, and slices of lemon meringue pie, mac & cheese, baked beans, and creamed spinach magically appeared from a grid of gleaming chrome windows. Then there was the eatery’s signature 5-cent coffee, cascading from ornate dolphin-headed spouts. Mel Brooks (who sings an homage he wrote specifically for the film), Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Colin Powell, Carl Reiner, and others pay effusive tribute to this communal Art Deco home away from home. Says Brooks: “You didn’t need a lot of money. You needed a lot of nickels.” Debut filmmaker Lisa Hurwitz collages rare artifacts, images, and memorabilia (including personal photos and deeply affectionate stories from former employees and the founding family) to create a love letter to the New York many of us still remember.

Friday
September 2nd

Screenings from 21:00

Venice Architecture Film Festival Competition: InHabitats

09:00 pm:  Vertical Shadow – 3rd qualified short film
By Felipe Elgueta and Ananke Pereira, Chile, 2022, 00:13:23

“Vertical Shadow” is a visual journey through the intimacy of migrant residents of a mega-building in Santiago. The pandemic forces them to spend their days locked in 17 square meters with 1.500 people.

09:15 pm:  Rodas  – 2nd qualified short film
By Manu Toro, Spain, 2022, 00:05:39

RODAS is an audiovisual project reflecting on the contemporary meaning of cohabitation. Poetics of the domestic formed with humor, magic and irony, articulating different moments of everyday life in a contemporary urban context.
Casa Rodas, projected by CIOestudio, is adaptable and progressive, capable of accommodating a great variety of uses with small variations, different ways of living and co-living. As a shared house the relationship between the public and private is central to the organization of the space. The shifting limit where the two meet reflects the relationship between its users.

ArchiTuned Selection

09:30 pm: Jugaad
By Chak Hin Leung, Hong Kong / India 2020. 7'.49''

A cow stops undisturbed in the middle of the road while scooters and cars whizz by as if it didn’t even exist. Every city has its own structure that derives from customs, habits, and different social stratifications. And every city poses challenges to its inhabitants. We are in Mumbai, and "Jugaad" is a Hindi word for a kind of “innovative fix or efficient solution that bends the rules.” The artist and architect Chak Hin Leung chose this very concept for the title of his short film that, through the absence of commentary or dialogue, shows how the inhabitants of Mumbai adapt to the city every day, actively conforming to its colourful and noisy spaces of coexistence. The camera becomes a respectful host of what happens in front of it, investigating how the city and its inhabitants are a whole that moves and evolves in unison.

09:40 pm: Ininfiammabile
a Project by RI-PRESE, Italy, 2022, 01'.00''

Open call on occasion of the centenary of “amateur cinema" to collect the historic films in 9.5mm format “Pathé Baby” among the old home memorabilia, a format widely used by families in the twenties and thirties of the twentieth century and whose centenary occurs in 2022.

09:45 pm: Structures of Mutual Support
NCCA, Philippines 2021. 18'.00''

Mutual support is a tradition where people come together for collective work to achieve a common goal. Structures of Mutual Support is a collaborative design and building project created by Sudarshan V. Khadka Jr, Alexander Eriksson Furunes, and the GK EF Community in Angat, Bulacan, Philippines. The documentary captures the mutual support process of creating a library and conflict mediation space that became the Philippine Pavilion at the 2021 Venice Architecture Biennale. A project commissioned by the National Commission for Culture and the Arts as well as the Department of Foreign Affairs, and the Office of Senator Loren Legarda.

10:00 pm: Homo hurbanus bogotanus
By Bêka & Lemoine, France/Italy 2018. 43'.00''

Homo Urbanus is a cinematic odyssey offering a vibrant tribute to what we have been most cruelly deprived of: namely, public space. Taking the form of a free-wheeling journey around the world (10 films, 10 cities), the project invites us to observe in detail the multiple forms and complex interactions that exist every day between people and their urban environments. Somewhere between visual anthropology and observational cinema, these films put urban man under the microscope and encourage us to take a closer look at individual and collective behaviour, interpersonal dynamics, social tensions, and the economic and political forces that play out every day on the grand stage of the city streets.

Saturday
September 3rd

Screenings from 21:00

Venice Architecture Film Festival Competition: InHabitats

09:00 pm:  Habitable Infrastructure: Science Fiction or the Future of the Countryside? – Competition Winner
By David Gak-Vassallo and Jeremie Mellul, Israel, 2022, 00:12:00

By 2050 the world will reach 10 billion people , 70 precent of which will live in the large cities. Israel, a small and already dense country, is projected to go through an even more drastic transformation by then. Even before the pandemic, concern of this future had already existed. The tech revolution allowed people to leave the office, and The City, behind. It allowed them to piece themselves together anywhere in the world, nomadically. What is the threshold that separates the countryside from the city, what is its future, and do we really have a choice?

Young Directors Award
Winner

Università della Svizzera Italiana - Accademia di Architettura

09:15 pm: L'attesa
By Alessandro Pasti, Maryia Sidorenko, Tobia De Eccher, Vittoria Morpurgo, Svizzera, 2022. 03'.21''

In a suspended condition between past and future, the city of Mendrisio with its realistic features resembles more and more as a metaphysical space, a point in an infinite line, where everything passes and nothing stops, except for us, constantly waiting.

Young Directors Award
Honorable Mention

The Berlage Center for Advanced Studies in Architecture and Urban Design
Faculty of Architecture and the build environment.

09:20 pm: Wrapping a Room
By Ana Herrero Cantis, Svizzera, 2022, 03'.02''

Ana lives surrounded by her landlord's objects. As time passes by, she learns to coexist in this unfamiliar domestic space.

Archituned Selection

09:25 pm: Spatial Rutual
By Lucas Bacle, France 2020. 04'.03''

Spacial Ritual is sensitive film trying to show ironically how architects would like to see their own projects experienced by users.

09:30 pm: Transience
By Matthew Ho, 25'.38''

What makes a home, a home? How does the design of a city implicate the way that people are able to live? The film depicts the lives of individuals who have experienced homelessness, focusing on the notion of what a home means and represents to them, while uncovering the struggles of constant impermanence within every facet of their lives.

09:55 pm: Les insulaires
By Adam W. Pugliese and Maxime Faure, France 2021. 50'.00''

By a river, between a large forest and a snow-capped mountain, towers emerge in the middle of the mist: The Islands. Its inhabitants seem to have been living here forever. However, they will soon have to vacate their apartments. Here, a few kilometers from Switzerland, 257 families are getting ready to move out. The public housing neighborhood will be demolished, leaving room mostly for private residences. How do you put 10, 20, 45 years of your life into cardboard boxes? And where do you go?

InHabitats Competition Jury

Ugo Carmeni

Visual artist

Ugo Carmeni, visual artist trained as an architect, during his studies deepens the research on spatial perceptions and their application in the field of the art, with particular attention to the installation dimension. Colorism, space and time, orientation and disorientation become typical themes of his work.
Since 2012 he has collaborated with various international artists and architects as the photographic interpreter of their production in the context of the Venice Biennale. He therefore establishes relationships of important influence for his own artistic path that lead him, among others, to London, Paris, Madrid, San Francisco and New York, where he creates multi-year working arrangements with artists such as Sarah Sze (USA) and Marco Maggi (Uruguay).
At the same time, he exhibits his works in various international museums and galleries collaborating with curators among which Daniela Ferretti and Ziva Kraus.
Researcher in the field of spatial representation methods, with particular reference to pre-Renaissance maps, Egyptian cartography and proto-photographic methods. Activity undertaken with the degree thesis and also carried out in collaboration with the Egyptian Museum of Turin under the direction of Eleni Vassilika.
From 2014 to 2022 he collaborates in teaching at the IUAV University of Venice.
In 2019 he participates in the 58th Venice Biennale of Art, collaborating with Ferzan Özpetek on the realization of the short film Venetiká.
In 2020, during the months of lockdown, he develops his research in the field of film making realizing Intervallo, a short film premiered at Isola Edipo-Giornate degli Autori, collateral event of the 77th Venice International Film Festival.
In 2021, he signed 8 minute line, a video tribute to Marco Maggi with music by Sylvia Meyer shown in Houston at Sicardi Gallery and In Paris at Xippas Gallery.
He is currently working on several international projects, both editorial and expositive.
Olivier Cazin

Director

School
  • DNSEP (Master II) Ecole Nationale Supérieure d’Art(s) de Paris-Cergy
  • DNAP (Master I) Ecole Nationale Supérieure d’Art(s) de Paris-Cergy
  • Graduate - Graphic Design - L’Institut Supérieur d’Arts Appliqués
Professional Background
  • Jardinier Paysagiste / Gardener - Landscape designer
  • Jardinier Ville de Paris / Gardener
  • Graphic designer
Filmography
  • Le geste final - (25mn) Production le G.R.E.C - avec Geoffroy Rondeau, Alexandre Michel, Miglen Mirtchev
  • I would like to be in America - ( 4,30mn) - vidéo - Production BBE
  • Une petite histoire de l’urbanisme - (10mn) - vidéo - Production BBE
  • SICTOM - (10x15mn) - vidéo - Production BBE et ENSAPC
  • Champions - ( 9,15mn) - vidéo - Production BBE et ENSAPC
Exhibitions (selected shows 2005 - 2012)
  • The Flesh / A Show - Berlin - curated by D. Mazières et Y.Geraud
  • Biennale de Belleville - Paris - curated by Patrice Joly, Muriel Enjalran, Judicaël Lavrador, Claire Moulène
  • Channel T.V - CNEAI - Paris-Chatou - curated by M. Mathé - France
  • Fluo brown / The final count ... - Palais de Tokyo - Paris - curated by J. Fronsacq
  • Braun Braun Braun - Ceaac - Strasbourg - curated by K. Detton
  • Communism of forms - Art Gallery of York University - Sao Paulo - curated by: E. Changur, F. Oliva, M.Rezende
  • Less is less, more is more and that’s all - CAPC - Bordeaux - curated by C. Laubard
  • This One Goes Up to 11 - Why+Wherefore.com /monkey town - New York - curated by S. Guthery, H. Mugaas, N. Weist
  • Looking at camera - Art in general - New York - Curated by H. Mugaas
  • Cine.mov - French Institute in Yokohama - / French Institute Tokyo - curated by A.M Morice and V. Godé
  • Spectrum city was the name - catalysts arts - Belfast • Vvork - Gallery West - Den Haag - curated by vvork.com
  • Marseille Artistes Associés - Musée d’Art Contemporain Marseille - On a proposal by Triangle France
  • Enlarge your practice - La friche - Marseille - curated by M.Villeneuve, C.Moulène, JM.Collard
  • Uni-super-blockhaus-total-parpaing - Oeen Group - Copenhagen - curated by Le commissariat
Astrig Chandèze-Avakian

Producer at Aeternam films (Paris)

She previously worked for almost 6 years with the producer Julie Paratian at Sister productions (France). She was involved in the production of more than ten films noticed in major festivals including DEMONS IN PARADISE by Jude Ratnam (1st film, Cannes Official Selection 2017) and SHOULD THE WIND DROP by Nora Martirosyan (1st film, Cannes Official Selection and ACID Cannes 2020). With Aeternam, she is working with young authors and she is developing fiction and documentary films.

IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm12165402/

Matteo D'Ambros

Professor at IUAV

Matteo D’Ambros is an architect, PhD in urbanism. He teaches urban design at the IUAV University in Venice.
Founder of the environmental group Ground Action, he co-curated "Up! Marghera on stage" exhibited at the Padiglione Venezia of XV Biennale Internazionale di Architettura di Venezia, 2016. He is co-editor of the book titled “Roberto Burle Marx. Verso un moderno paesaggio tropicale”, Poligrafo edition, 2014.
Luka Skansi

Associate Professor, Politecnico di Milano

I am an architectural historian, since 2019 associate professor at Politecnico di Milano. I hold a Master of Science in Architecture from University IUAV in Venice, and a doctoral degree in History of Architecture and Cities from the School for Advanced Studies in Venice, obtained in 2006 with a research on pre-revolutionary Russia (1900-1917).
My research interests include Italian architecture and engineering of the 20th century, Russian and Soviet architecture, the architecture in ex-Yugoslavia. I wrote books, essays and articles on Carlo Scarpa, Aldo Rossi, Gino Valle, Pier Luigi Nervi, Myron Goldsmith, Jože Plečnik, Nikolaj Ladovskij, Moisei Ginzburg, Peter Behrens, Manfredo Tafuri, Vladimir Braco Mušič.
In 2009 I received a Bruno Zevi Honorable Mention Prize for a historical-critical essay on the architectural culture of late tsarist Russia. In 2012 I was a Visiting Scholar at the Canadian Center for Architecture in Montreal, where I conducted a research on the teaching methods applied at the Vkhutemas – the renowned Soviet Avant-Garde school in the USSR in the 1920s. I was a Visiting Professor at the Faculty of Architecture in Ljubljana (Slovenia, 2011) and Belgrade (Serbia, 2013), and at the Art History department of the University Ca Foscari in Venice (Italy, 2014).
In 2018 I was honoured to receive the Plečnik medal for a contribution to the architectural culture 2018, given by the Chamber of Architects Ljubljana, Slovenia, for the research project "Streets and Neighbourhoods. Vladimir Braco Mušič and Large Scale Architecture", and for the curatiorial work on the exhibition at the Museum of Architecture and Design in Ljublhana.
At the moment I am a member of the Teaching Committee of the School of Doctorate
Studies at the Faculty of Architecture IUAV in Venice and of the Doctorate School of the Faculty of Architecture in Belgrade.
Venice Architecture Film Festival