Masterclass by Emilija Skarnulyte.
Presenting her first feature documentary film “Burial” (2022) in this year Scanorama, one of the most internationally acknowledged Lithuanian visual artists, Emilija Skarnulyte, will delve into the details of her feature film debut, the topics and process of her artworks as well as will hopefully shape our opinion whether the contemporary artist can remain apolitical.
In discussing her work with Nadim Samman of Vdrome in December 2018, Skarnulyte said "In my films from the last ten years, I have mostly researched places where contemporary political issues are staged between human and non-human worlds, the shifting boundaries between ecological and cosmic forces. I want to feel out all kinds of non-human and post-human scales in the depths of space and time."
Existing between fiction and documentary, Emilija works primarily with deep time, from the cosmic and geologic to the ecological and political. Working between documentary and the imaginary, she makes films and immersive installations exploring invisible structures. Her blind grandmother gently touches the weathered statue of a Soviet dictator. Neutrino detectors and particular colliders measure the cosmos with otherworldly architecture. Post-human species swim through submarine tunnels above the Arctic Circle and crawl through tectonic fault lines in the Middle Eastern desert.
E. Skarnulyte was the winner (out of 5800 entries) of the Future Generation Art Prize 2019, collateral event at the Venice Biennale, the global art prize for artists aged 35 and younger. After the masterclass the audience will be able to participate in a Q&A session.
Emilija Skarnulyte (b. Vilnius, Lithuania, 1987) is an artist and filmmaker. Winner of the 2019 Future Generation Art Prize, Skarnulytė represented Lithuania at the XXII Triennale di Milano and was included in the Baltic Pavilion at the 2018 Venice Biennale of Architecture. With solo exhibitions at Radvila Palace Museum of Art in Vilnius, Tate Modern in London (2021), Kunsthaus Pasquart (2021), Den Frie (2021), National Gallery of Art in Vilnius (2021), CAC (2015) and Kunstlerhaus Bethanien (2017), she has participated in group shows at Ballroom Marfa, Seoul Museum of Art, Kadist Foundation, and the First Riga Biennial. In 2022, Skarnulytė participated in the group exhibition Penumbra organized by Fondazione In Between Art Film on the occasion of the 59th Venice Biennale. Her numerous prizes include the Kino der Kunst Project Award, Munich (2017); Spare Bank Foundation DNB Artist Award (2017), and the National Lithuanian Art Prize for Young Artists (2016). She was nominated as the candidate for the Ars Fennica Art Award 2023 in Finland. She received an undergraduate degree from the Brera Academy of Art in Milan and holds a masters from the Tromsø Academy of Contemporary Art.
Her films are in the IFA, Kadist Foundation and Centre Pompidou collections and have been screened at the Serpentine Gallery, UK, Centre Pompidou, France, and the Museum of Modern Art, New York and in numerous film festivals including Visions du Reel, HOT DOCS, Rotterdam, Busan and Oberhausen international film festivals. Most recently she concluded her tenures at Art Explora and Cite des Art, which occurred on the heels of another residency at the MAK Center for Art and Architecture. She is a founder of Polar Film Lab, a collective for analog film practice located in Tromsø, Norway and a member of the artistic duo New Mineral Collective, recently commissioned for a new work by the First Toronto Biennial.
Filmography: “Aldona”, documentary short (2013), “Hollow Earth”, documentary short (2013, co-director), “Sirenomelia”, short film-installation (2018), “Mirror Matter”, short film (2018), “Eternal Return”, short film-installation (2021), “Circular Time. For Aleksandra Kasuba”, short film-installation (2021), “Aphotic Zone”, short film (2022), “Burial”, documentary feature film (2022).
Moderator:
Goda Januskeviciute, Lecturer at The Lithuanian Journalism Centre, author of science communication program, member of Vilnius Actors Studio creative initiative. Numerous years contributed to Delfi.lt, Alfa.lt, Lietuvos rytas, Lietuvos žinios editorial offices. Manager of industry events at European Film Forum Scanorama.
Event in Lithuanian.
The event took place on November 20th, 2022.