The passion of survival
by Ina Kutulas

Imagine a Box Talk session moderated by Carl von Karstedt. The participants are Eva Stefani, „The Boy” and Friedrich Liechtenstein. One might think: all of them would sit „opposite” each other but definitely not together. One might think: that this is more like a confrontation than consensual chatting. In a discussion, two always seem to form a couple, with an opposing third party. Anyone who has already seen Eva Stefani’s films “Athens” and “The Bathers” at HELLAS FILMBOX BERLIN may well presume that she relates more to “The Boy” than to Friedrich Liechtenstein. Eva Stefani and “The Boy – “sent out” a message: “The world falls apart – one way or another, under any political system”? Or does the present-day indicate for them something entirely different?
Is Friedrich Liechtenstein disassociating his position through cheerfulness from “the Greeks”? But anyone who knows Friedrich Liechtenstein’s music video “Do not sing while swimming” could clearly see him in the company of Eva Stefani, the director of “The Bathers”. Or will “The Boy” as a musician be the one who comes closer to the musician Liechtenstein? Is he someone that can easily make the transition from the music world to the movie world? Does the non-character from Voulgaris’ film “The Thread” approximate closely to the absent young generation in “The Bathers”, while in “The Bathers” the older generation is “in focus”?
Will Liechtenstein, who was brought up in East Germany, relate himself to the ‘’invisible wall’’ surrounding the city of Athens like the Berlin Wall, in the film of Voulgaris’? Considering the disparity of dictatorships – will there be a conversation about “Life and Death”? Will the presenter Carl von Karlstedt, who once worked in a weaving mill, be willing to discover an Ariadne with a red coloured common thread everywhere? Erroneous ways, decline, destruction, border crossing, all thread through the labyrinths of dictatorships. We have four strong personalities who could discuss the “passion of survival”. Or is it going to be something entirely different?

Friedrich Liechtenstein
was born in 1956 as Hans-Holger Friedrich in East Germany and has worked in the theater under different capacities until 2002. He first came to the public’s eye attention at that time, after a major personal crisis. Since then, the subject matters that he has focused upon have been ‘life as a work of art’ and ‘the power of narration’. He is the Director of the First Vertical Film Festival.

The Boy
The Boy is passionate about films, filmmaking and the world of cinema. He has written, directed, produced and acted in many of his own films, as well as the films of his fellow directors. He is also widely known for his music and performs across Europe, having released a number of solo albums and composed numerous music scores for films.
Filmography: Thread (2016), Higuita (2012), Pink (2006), Crying? (2003).

Eva Stefani
Documentary filmmaker and visual artist. She currently works as an assistant professor of Cinema Studies at the University of Athens and as a visiting professor at Freie University, Berlin. She studied cinema and anthropology in Paris, London and New York (Ecole Varan, New York University, National Film School). She has written two books on documentary and a book of poetic prose “Fin’s Hair”.
Her films have been screened in various international film festivals (IDFA, Cinema du Reel FIPA, Lisboa Docs etc) and art shows. Most recent DOCUMENTA14. She has won several awards, among which 1st prize at Cinema du Reel, Paris and “FIPRESCI award”.

Carl von Karstedt
Obviously Carl von Karstedt was born. Since then he has founded businesses, made a couple of films, won Germany’s Grimme award for the documentary ‘Kunst und Verbrechen’ (Art and Crime), raised a monkey and has universally tried to keep life adventurous. He would love to be politically involved but finds German party politics so toxic, that he has thus far abstained from it. He thinks that a better future is possible but unlikely.

HELLAS FILMBOX BERLIN Box Talk