Francesca Fini – OPHELIA dID NOT DROWN
Italia 1:30:00Synopsis: ”Ophelia Did Not Drown” is an experimental film that surrealistically reinterprets Shakespeare’s drama from the point of view of young Ophelia. The film was produced in association with the Institute Luce Cinecittà and integrates seemingly irreconcilable languages: the historical, anthropological and sociological repertoire of Luce and original performances produced by the artist for this project.
At the center of it all is an Ophelia who is different from the one handed down by the literary tradition: not a fragile teenager, but many women of different colors, features and ages.
A modern and bittersweet Ophelia. An Ophelia who instead of being lost in the woods of Denmark, is among sharp Lazio landscapes: from evocative industrial Rome Gazometro to the Scrap Center in Cisterna di Latina, from the arid limestone caves of Villa Riano to the marvelous family Perugini Villa Futuristica in Fregene, passing through a crazy sightseeing tour on a bus tour of the capital. An Ophelia who in the end does not drown, renouncing her destiny as a romantic heroine to become a “normal person”.
Bio: Francesca Fini is an artist working with new media, experimental cinema and performance art.
With in-depth training as a digital artist and filmmaker, she has worked for 15 years in the field of TV production: as production coordinator for the 21 episodes of “Alfabeto Italiano (Italian Alphabet)”, for Làntia Cinema and RAI3, for the series “Senza Fine (Endless)” with Gualtiero Peirce, also for RAI3, as writer and director of three creative documentaries, currently offered by the platform “On The Docks”.
In 2000 she met the American artist Kristin Jones and collaborated with her on the project “Tevereterno”, creating installations for the city of Rome. Along with Kristin Jones, Kiki Smith and other international artists she participated at the 2008 River to River Festival in New York, projecting her film “Moon Loop” onto the trees along the Hudson River. From that moment she orients herself in a decisive manner towards experimental film and video art.
Some of the significant events she has taken part in in recent years include: the WRO Biennale in Wroclaw in 2011, where she was in the performance sector along with Stelarc and Istvan Kantor, the ADD Festival at the Museum Macro in Rome, RomaEuropa Festival, the final selection for the Arte Laguna Prize in Venice and the International Celeste Prize in New York, the Film Festival in Montpellier, the Berlin Directors Lounge, IKONO TV Film Festival, the FILE Electronic Language International Festival in Brazil, Fonlad Digital Art Festival, Videoformes Clermont-Ferrand, CologneOFF and Magmart Video Art Festival, which she won in 2010, 2012 and 2013.
In 2012 she was invited to participate at the “Venice International Performance Art Week” by VestAndPage, which hosted among others the work of Valie Export, Jan Fabre, Yoko Ono, Boris Nieslony and Hermann Nitsch. In 2013 she won the “Fonlad Performance Art Residency” to prepare a new performance at Coimbra with the support of the Italian Institute of Culture in Lisbon and she was invited to Chicago for the Rapid Pulse International Performance Art Festival.
In 2014 she was selected for the Margaret Guthman Prize, a prize for electronic arts relating to music, sponsored by the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta. Additionally in 2014 she was invited to Kolkata, India for the performing arts festival “Ghosts of Shakespeare” and to lecture at the Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute. She was also selected for the prestigious Videoart Yearbook by the Department of Visual Arts at the University of Bologna and won a scholarship to attend the Watermill Center Summer Program in 2014, headed by Bob Wilson in New York.
In 2015 she created and directed the Festival HI> DANCE at Lanificio in Rome, dedicated to the new languages of dance and technology, created with the support of Roma Capitale and sponsored by the Department for European Policies of the Council of Ministers, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation. She has recently participated at festivals, exhibitions and residencies supported by the Italian Cultural Institute in New Delhi, Toronto and Lisbon.
In 2015 she won the awards Prix Université Blaise Pascal des étudiants and the Prize Conseil Général du Puy-de-Dome at the Videoformes Festival of Digital Arts in France. Additionally in 2015 the film “Mother-Rythm” won the “most innovative language” award, sponsored by the Polish Film Institute for the Szczecin European Film Festival. In 2015 she won a scholarship for a new winter residency at the Watermill Center.
She recently made “Ofelia non annega (Ophelia Did Not Drown)”, an experimental feature film co-produced and distributed by Istituto Luce Cinecittà.
“I am basically a performer. The action of a body, generally mine, in space and time is essential in my work. My videos and my tangible works are the chapters of a never-ending story of which I am the protagonist. I believe that all Art should be “gesamtkunstwerk”.
My body, the ship on which I make this long exploration, has always been a battlefield. Former anorexic, eternal feminist, still and always a lone wolf in search of the moon between the branches of the trees.”