Laura Zalenga: “In Front of the Screen” - IFFR 2023
06 February 2023
“In Front of The Screen” shows a glimpse into the humans who are IFFR. Visitors, filmmakers, volunteers, organisers, press, and the media-team. Here they are asked about their experience in front of the screen; making the festival possible, watching movies, deciding on movie choices, reflecting on movies, writing about movies, and seeing their own movies having a world premier.
My name is Laura Zalenga
I am a portrait photographer originally from Germany, I have been living in Rotterdam for about 4 years. I create conceptual portraits and self portraits, though I actually call the latter ones “not-my-self-portraits”, as I aim to be an anonymous person in the photograph. In my work I am especially interested in the relation between humans and nature, as well as exploring gender and advocating for a spectrum instead of a binary.
For the IFFR Media Outreach and Inclusion scheme I pitched a small project of this kind, because it seemed like a perfect place to try and create such portraits. Films from an incredible amount of countries and with a large diversity in topics and filmmakers attract a diverse group of people, and, of course, such a project lives from getting different perspectives.
What was your experience during the project ?
It was so nice to finally do a project again that involves not only portraying but also interviewing people. Especially after the isolating effects of the pandemic, I now had to collect some courage the first few times I asked people at the festival if they would be willing to be part of my project. But the worries of rejection were unnecessary; out of 20 people I asked, 18 said yes.
Because this is not the first time I did such a portrait & interview project, I am not as surprised about it anymore, but it was a great reminder of the magic of such projects. Talking to people and asking them about something they care about is always inspiring. In the span of three days I talked to a media-student from China joining IFFR as a volunteer, a filmmaker from the US with Ukrainian roots, an assistant director from the Dominican Republic, a writer from Turkey studying in Paris, a Russian humanitarian refugee who is a film critic living in Germany, a queer creative from Egypt living in Rotterdam, and a musician and filmmaker from the Philippines. I talked to people with an amazing range of ages, gender identities, bodies, sexual orientations, beliefs, abilities… All of them have different reasons for why they are joining IFFR and what defines their love for movies, but it is that love that brings them together.
Where we can find more of your work
