Carlos Casas

Carlos Casas (born in Barcelona in 1974) is a Spanish filmmaker and visual artist. His work is a cross between documentary film, cinema, and contemporary visual and sound arts. His last three films have been awarded in festivals around the world from Torino, Madrid, Buenos Aires, and Mexico City and some of his video works have been presented in collective and personal exhibitions.In 2001 he started a trilogy of work dedicated to the most extreme environments on the planet, Patagonia, Aral sea, and Siberia. He has collaborated with musicians and artists from Phill Niblock, Z'EV, Nico Vascellari, Prurient, Sebastian Escofet, Nastro Mortal.

Biography

Carlos Casas studied fine arts, cinema and design. In 1998 he was awarded an Artist-in-residence in Fabrica, research and communication center of Benetton.^[1][2] In 2000 his short Film “Afterwords”, produced by Marco Müller and Fabrica Cinema was selected for Venice Film Festival,^[3] International Film Festival Rotterdam and Reencontres du Cinema in Paris 2001. In 2001 he started a series of documentaries for Colors Magazine,^[4] and a series of Fieldworks, an ongoing experiment with ambiental video and radio frequencies, a sort of landscape video notes, in 2003 he developed a 52 min documentary,”Rocinha. Daylight of a favela” Shot on location in one of the biggest favelas in Rio de Janeiro.He also publish a compilation of Funk Carioca in collaboration with DJ Marlboro and Irma Records. In 2004 he finished “Aral. Fishing in an invisible sea” about the life of the three remaining generation of Fishermen in the Aral sea, which won the best documentary award in Torino Film festival 2004, and was selected for the International Film Festival Rotterdam 2005. Visions du Réel documentary film festival, Nyon, Switzerland 2005, One World Prague 2005, and Documenta Madrid 2005 where it received the special mention from the jury. In May 2005 he finished a 52 min version of the Patagonia research “Solitude at the end of the world”which received the special prize from the Jury in BAFICI Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema 2006. The Siberia project ”Hunters since the beginning of time” is the last chapter of a trilogy of films dedicated to the most extreme environments in the world. (Patagonia, Aral, Siberia) was awarded Best Documentary Award in FICCO Mexico International Film Festival 2008. In 2008 he published a selection of forbidden funk [Proibidão]Proibidao CV: Forbidden Gang Funk From Rio de Janeiro for the label Sublime Frequencies. In 2007 he presented in different festivals in his latest work Tundra from the Siberian Fieldworks series,^[5] a live media project premiered at Netmage Festival^[6] in Bologna and Sonar.^[7] and was also presented in Multiplicidade in Rio de Janeiro. In 2008 he founded together with fellow artist friend, Nico Vascellari Von Archives an audiovisual label publishing experimental audiovisual productions. Later in 2009 he created with partner and wife Saodat Ismailova, Map Productions, a production house dedicated to develop audiovisual projects around the world, from feature films, to documentaries. In 2010 he presented his Cemetery Archive Works in Netmage and his End trilogy was presented for the first time in Cineteca Mexicana. In june 2010 Hangar Bicocca in Milano presented END a comprehensive exhibition of the trilogy. Avalanche (overture) his latest project is a collaboration with the American sound artist and minimalist legend Phill Niblock an ongoing project based in the Pamir mountains, in one of the world's highest inhabited villages. Avalanche (overture) superimposes Casas' footage over the overtones of "Stosspeng," a piece by Niblock. It is a visual-sonic journey, an extremely intense audiovisual meditation and a sensory experience in which extremes meet: nature in its rawest state and the pure, breathtaking and heady sound of drones. Presented for the first time in its first incarnation in Sonar Festival, Avalanche is an open film, reedited every time it is shown and adapted to the space it is presented Avalanche is an organic example of film-making, an ongoing document to the disappearance of this village, a reactive film within its community, Avalanche is alive together with the village, dying and born again every time it is presented. He is currently working on a film about a cemetery of elephants on the borders between India and Nepal.

Filmography

• Avalanche (2010-ongoing)^{[8][9][10][11]}
• Hunters Since the Beginning of Time (2008)^[12]
• Solitude at the End of the Time (2005) ^[13][14]
• Aral. Fishing in an Invisible Sea (2004) ^[15][16]
• Rocinha. Daylight of a Favela (2003) ^[17]
• Afterwords (2000) ^[18]

Awards

Best Documentary Award FICCO 2007 (Mexico International Film Festival) for Hunters since the beginning of time
Special prize of the Jury BAFICI 2006 (Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema) for Solitude at the end of the world
Best Documentary Award Torino Film Festival 2004 for Aral. Fishing in an invisible sea
Special prize of the jury Documenta Madrid 2005 for Aral. Fishing in an invisible sea

External links

• Carlos Casas website
  Carlos Casas youtube Channel
  Carlos Casas Vimeo channel
  Carlos Casas the wire interview
  The Wire magazine
  Carlos Casas at Hangar Bicocca Domus magazine
  Carlos Casas digicult interview
  Netmage 2010 digicult interview
  Recent Exhibitions
  Exibart
  Review Hunters since the beginning of time
  Review Solitude at the end of the world
  Siberian Fieldworks at Galerie Davide Gallo Berlin
  Carlos Casas, Thomas Köner - Ways to Nowhere (Italian)
  BLOGS&DOCS "Buscar los orígenes",
  Abitare Carlos Casas "Spazi di suono"

Galleries

• e/static in Turin
• Galerie Davide Gallo in Berlin

References