Ophelia (art) - digital painting of a doll by Barbara Agreste

Film Statement

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Barbara Agreste’s Film Statement

My films are experimental, I work very much with animation, but I often mix two dimensional successions of drawings and three-dimensional settings (animated using the “stop motion” technique) with real life shots.

I like crossing over layers of different bits of film that were created with these different techniques. A lot of time based images in my films are abstract, I do not use narrative, action, or talking, and the narration is for me what happens through the succession of images and places that appear on the screen one after the other with their elements moving into and out of the frame.

Very often I include figurative elements to the scenes that I construct: they could be objects created with clay carefully put in the right place to signify a particular concept, real human beings moving and conveying particular emotions, or falling plants and water to give to the viewer the sense that a change is in progress.

I think the most important thing in a movie is the shape of the objects or their colors that alone can express a mood or send a message without the need of words.

It is useful for me to stop for some time working with the camera, and start dealing with materials like paper, water, glue, canvas and clay: my video work is very much connected to the making of art, I think more like a sculptor, or a photographer, I am much more a maker of shapes that when interlaced with time and sound make things happen, rather than a story teller using film but narrating through language.

Video Art - Film Statement explaining video and film work by Barbara Agreste.