Common People | Sediments (2021)

The series of documentary film screenings “Common People” initiated by the Kaunas Artists’ House and the platform “Kitas Kinas” continues!

The Common People 2022 program examines the individual’s relationship with the environment and the landscape in which they live and work. We will look at the landscape as a factor generating social, political, and ecological meanings. The program’s films will reveal not only the beauty or issues of landscapes but also the contexts in which they exist, as well as their positive or negative influence on the individual and vice versa. Travelling from idyllic provincial landscapes to polluted metropolises, we will focus on historical layers of the environment, ecological and personal human tragedies, and social issues. We will try to understand how the relationship between man and space changes in the face of today’s challenges.

THE SECOND SCREENING

27th of October at 7 p.m. at Kaunas artists’ house hall, with the film by Spanish director Adrián Silvestre—”Sediments”—we will invite the audience to look deeper into themselves. Like the Earth, our interior is formed by different strata, which forge our identity and tell our life story. What circumstances intervene in this process and make us become who we are today?

More about the film and the director:

Six trans women travel to a small town in León, where they will explore unusual landscapes and the ins and outs of their personalities. They will learn to deal with their differences by looking for answers about what connects them as a group.

“Sediments” is an engaging and fun story about empathy, individuality, and the need to belong. It is the present radiography of a collective, which looks into the past and projects itself into the future, celebrating the extraordinary possibility of being unique and unrepeatable.

Adrián Silvestre studied Audiovisual Communication, Film Direction and Contemporary Art History in Madrid, Rome and Havana. He’s been a resident artist at the Real Academia de España en Roma and the Académie de France.In his film projects, he explores the limits between reality and fiction, staging real people alongside professional performers and taking on artistic practice by analyzing their life experiences.
“The Objects of Love” (2016) is his first feature film. It was showcased in an extensive tour of international film festivals, winning numerous awards, such as the FIPRESCI at Seville European Film Festival.
“Sediments” (2021), his second feature film, has won the Feroz Award 2022 for best national non-fiction film, presented at BFI London FF, San Sebastian FF, Thessaloniki Documentary FF (Special Jury Prize), Malaga Film Festival, Gottembourg FF, Cinespaña Toulouse (Best Documentary), Outfest Los Angeles (Grand Jury Special Mention) and Newfest NY, among others.
After its World premiere at International Film Festival Rotterdam (Big Screen Official Competition), My Emptiness and I has just won the silver Biznaga, Special Jury Prize at the 25th Malaga Film Festival and Premio Maguey / Best Film at 37th Guadalajara International Film Festival, among other prizes.

Documentary, Spain, 2021. Spanish with English and Lithuanian subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing, 89 min.

PARTICIPATION AT THE EVENT IS FREE OF CHARGE
The film screening will be accompanied by Vaida’s and Aei’s from “Trans Autonomija”—a trans people’s rights and mutual aid association established at the end of 2021—conversation. The Conversation will be about the importance of community for trans people in Lithuania, what leads different people to gather in a community/ to organize together, what we do together as “Trans Autonomija”, and how we can gather and organize despite our differences (or considering them).

The Common People screening series aims to discuss the content of documentary films and the whole notion of documentary cinema. The series addresses questions of ethics and directorial decisions. To film or not to film? When does a director cross the line of closeness with their subject? Should documentary cinema reflect ‘reality’ or the vision of its creator? These questions and others are raised and discussed by looking at films that closely look at people telling their own stories: sensitive, creative, eccentric and based somewhere in the margins.

The project is curated by Karolis Žukas (Kitas Kinas) and Edvinas Grinkevičius (Kaunas Artists’ House).
Visual identity: Eglė Simonavičiūtė.
The project is financed by the Lithuanian Film Center and organized by Kaunas Artists’ House. Partners: platform Kitas Kinas and Kaunas Deaf Rehabilitation Centre.