Cláudia Varejão was born in Porto and studied film in the Artistic Creativity and Creation Program offered by the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, alongside the German Film und Fernsehakademie Berlin, and in São Paulo’s International Film Academy. She also studied photography at AR.CO, in Lisbon. She directed the documentary short film Wanting and the fictional short film trilogy Weekend, Cold Day and Morning Light. In the Darkness of the Theater I Take off My Shoes is her first feature film. Ama-San 海女さん is her most recent film. Besides working as a director, she has carved a path in photography.
2016 | Portugal, Suíça, Japão | DOC | 112’
14 Oct | 21h30 | Cinema Trindade (Opening Session)
A dive, the midday sunlight filtering down through the water. The air in her lungs has to last until she can dislodge the abalone. Dives like these have been carried out in Japan for over 2000 years by the Ama-San.
MEETING
18 Oct | 18h30 | Passos Manuel
Introduction to the work of Cláudia Varejão by Nelson Araújo. Talk with the artist.
2016 | Portugal | DOC | 104’
18 Oct | 21h30 | Passos Manuel (Awards Ceremony)
The National Ballet of Portugal is celebrating its 40th anniversary. Since its foundation, it has aimed to present the great classics, as well as to always welcome contemporary creations. Day-to-day life is demanding for dancers, choreographers, musicians, répétiteurs, seamstresses, light technicians, sound technicians, and other elements of a large staff that make it possible for dance to travel through the rehearsal rooms and linger in the hallways before making it onto the stage. This film fol- lows not only the company’s creations and premieres, but mainly each dancer’s silent and structural work.
19 Oct | 17h00 | Passos Manuel
2007 | Portugal | FIC | 9’
A country house. A weekend. A family. Time goes by. Silence prevails. “But listen to the breath of the unceasing message made of silence”, R. M. Rilke.
2009 | Portugal | FIC | 27’
Cold Day is a portrait of a first relationship, previous to the external world, the one of the family. In a winter in Lisbon, father, mother, son and daughter, trace the path of a day by themselves. A film that develops through characters who have for their antagonist life itself, with nothing (and everything) heroic about it.
2012 | Portugal | FIC | 18’
Morning Light closes a circle of three short films by Cláudia Varejão on family (dis)encounters, where the roads do not always coincide and unexpected disruptions are not necessarily the result of a failure. Everyday life hides larger and quieter forces and their understanding is often presented as a task too violent or even useless. Whatever the look that is allowed to live, the transcendence of human relations will always be there, front, unwavering and gross. Morning Light approaches the distance between three generations – mother, daughter and granddaughter. In a dense river that unites them, for no apparent reason other than exhaustion, a fissure emerges.