FICTIVE LANDSCAPES

In the telling of stories, these landscapes permeate their narratives, becoming metaphorical, contextual, signifying or emotive. We witness the interplay of nature, narrative and guilt played out between two adolescents in a fi eld, while a wild bull-run becomes the landscape for a tale of love and intolerance. One man struggles to maintain love within the encroaching wilderness of 1840’s Canada, while yet others walk in isolation through landscapes layered with fears, memories and dreams. See below for full programme details.

Friday 26th October, 5pm
Heart of Hawick, Tower Mill

Bird

Directed by: Alasdair Bayne
Not a premiere

Running time: 00:13:37
Year: 2011
Country: Scotland

Synopsis:

A film about adolescence, nature and guilt. Is it in our nature to harm, or does it come from somewhere else?

Biography/Filmography:

'In Search of the Wallaby' 2012 (12 mins) Documentary. Director/Editor. SDI Productions, Blue Iris Films.
'Bird' 2011 (14 mins) Fiction. Writer/Director/Editor. Strange films.
'Strange Places' (15 mins) Fiction. Writer/Director/Editor. Strange films.

Artist's Website: http://www.strangefilms.net

Venue: Main auditorium - Heart of Hawick, Tower Mill
Screening date: Friday 26th October
Screening time: 5pm
Tickets: £4 (for the 'Fictive Landscapes' programme)
Programme: Fictive Landscapes

Broken Compass

Directed by: Enrique Verdugo
Scottish Premiere, United Kingdom premiere, European premiere, World premiere

Running time: 0:04:20
Year: 2011
Country: United Kingdom

Synopsis:

Time confers to garments part of our life and memories.
A broken compass, where the east and west loose all sense of direction, leaves the space open to the traveller, to chase for the vanishing moment, with no directions, in the battle to free the senses, enabling the search for a place to set the psychomagic act, where no garments are needed apart from the personal alchemy.

Biography/Filmography:

Enrique was born in Chile and grew up in Santiago. After some turbulent years and post dictatorship scenarios, he resolved to move and live in the Atacama desert for a couple of years. He was changed by mystical experiences of living in these highlands. His passion for arts and literature made him embrace photography and film as his medium of expression. Enrique returned to Santiago to start his visual studies where he worked as a freelance photographer and received recognition for his work.

Artist's Website: http://enriquever.com

Diary of Pamplona

Directed by: Gonzalo Egurza
Scottish Premiere, United Kingdom premiere

Running time: 00:16:30
Year: 2011
Country: Argentina

Synopsis:

A trip to Pamplona in the early 70s. Behind the lovely travel diaries, lies a story of love and intolerance.

HD video on super8 found footage

Biography/Filmography:

Born in Buenos Aires in 1984, he graduate at the Universidad del Cine in Buenos Aires where he studied film direction. He teaches at the university in matters Audiovisual Techniques with Andrés Denegri and Digital Techniques with Gabriela Golder.
He also works as a director, producer and post producer in cultural management and in the commercial category.
His personal production focuses on the independent film making such as Experimental Film, Video Art and Video Installations. All of his work takes part in local and international festivals and programs such as The International Festival of Short Films in Oberhausen, Les Instant Video (France), Federculture (Rome), among others.

Has been awarded with the 1st price in the 2011 Independent Film Festival of La Plata, Argentina.

Artist's Website: http://www.gonzaloegurza.com.ar

Venue: Main Auditorium - Tower Mill, Heart of Hawick
Screening date: Friday 26th October
Screening time: 5pm
Tickets: £4 (for the 'Fictive Landscapes' programme)
Programme: Fictive Landscapes

Good Evening

Directed by: Dean Kavanagh
United Kingdom premiere

Running time: 00:12:01
Year: 2012
Country: Ireland

Synopsis:

Memories and experiences during the day and the night.

Biography/Filmography:

Dean Kavanagh is an independent, avant-garde, low/no- budget filmmaker from Ireland. While being an active filmmaker from an early age, Dean began to favour more ‘visual stories’ and from 2006 onwards he began to reduce conventional narrative elements.

In 2008 Dean was discovered by independent Iranian filmmaker Rouzbeh Rashidi. From then, Dean concentrated on experimental filmmaking. During the period 2008-2010 he made around 15 shorts as part of the Dublin based “Experimental Film Society” established by Rashidi.

Overall, Dean's work to-date could be described as visual with attention to the image/sound relationship. His films feature non-professional actors, natural/available light and are shot with little to no crew and no budgets. A selection of his works have been screened internationally

In 2012, he resumed collaborations with EFS as a platform for his films.

Dean holds a degree in Media Arts, and has also composed music for short films and a collection of his own experimental/concept projects.

Dean was born in Dublin, Ireland (1989) and currently resides in County Wicklow, Ireland.

Artist's Website: http://deankavanagh.com

Venue: Main Auditorium, Tower Mill, Heart of Hawick
Screening date: Friday 26th October
Screening time: 5pm
Tickets: £4 (for the 'Fictive Landscapes' programme)
Programme: Fictive Landscapes

No More Shall We Part

Directed by: Shaun Hughes
Not a premiere

Running time: 00:24:55
Year: 2011
Country: Scotland

Synopsis:

Canada, 1840s. A small cottage sits alone in the mountains, dwarfed by the surrounding landscape. Its inhabitants, a humble married couple who have been driven from their home country of Scotland during the Highland Clearances, have fallen on desperate times.

Driven to the edge and in isolation, Henry, a man with an unshakeable devotion to his wife and God, struggles to maintain normalcy in the face of sheer desperation, until an unexpected arrival threatens to shatter his world completely.

No More Shall We Part examines the lengths that we will go to in order to preserve the love of another in the face of adversity, weaving a beautiful, brooding tale of one man’s struggle against the wilderness and his own psyche.

Biography/Filmography:

Shaun Hughes graduated from Grays School of Art in Aberdeen and, in 2005, went on to complete a Masters degree in Fine Art at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design in Dundee where he showed an aptitude and passion for narrative filmmaking. Since then he has co-founded a small film production company, Factotum Films, with friends and collaborators Tim Courtney and Caroline Smith.

Shaun has had success with various projects including music videos, experimental work and short films, most notably his short film Mother (2009), which was distributed worldwide as part of Aesthetica Magazine’s Short Film Competition 2010 and has also screened at Bradford International Film Festival 2011.

Having recently completed an MA in Film Directing at Edinburgh College of Art and finishing his latest short, an ambitious unconventional western entitled No More Shall We Part; Shaun is now working on his first feature film.

Artist's Website: http://nomoreshallwepart.co.uk/