Istanbul Experimental

2th Istanbul International Experimental Film Festival

Programme Competition Panorama Special Events Venues Jury Winners Contributors Credits

Paolo Simoni

Paolo Simoni, founder and director of Home Movies - National Family Archive, has been the author of many publications on the evaluation, reuse and recovery of cinematographic cultural heritage. After collaborating with Cineteca di Bologna and various festivals, he has been doing researches at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia since 2005. Simoni, the creator and curator of installations and exhibitions that are organized by Home Movies; more recently, he is also interested in documentary film production based on film archives as a writer, producer and consultant.

Terry Flaxton

Terry Flaxton began working with sound in 1970, film in 1971 and analog video in 1976 creating installations, television, art, drama and documentaries. He won prizes at the Tokyo, Locarno and Montbeliard festivals amongst others. He was commissioned for Channel 4’s Ghosts in the Machine, his work has been televised on Alive from Off-Center in the USA and Avance Sur Image in France and across Europe. He created and directed a 5 part series on the subject of video art for Channel 4. His moving image work has recently exhibited to audiences of 1.2 million at the Cathedral of St John the Divine in New York. His work is in various international collections.

As a cinematographer he worked with analogue HD; shot 4 feature films in both film and video and pioneered Higher Dynamic Range Data Cinematography between 2007 and 2017. Terry shot for Apple during the making of Ridley Scott’s 1984 commercial; shot the third ever video to cinema releases in 1987; he has photographed Grace Jones, Madonna, Van Morrisson, Sting, Yuri Bashnnikov, Kiri Te Kanawa and many more musicians.

As an academic in 2007 he won an AHRC Creative Research Fellowship then in 2010 an AHRC Knowledge Exchange Fellowship at University of Bristol. He became a professor of Cinematography at University of the West of England and Director of the Centre for Moving Image Research in 2013 which he ran until 2017 and organised several international Cinematography Festivals. He recently received his accreditation as Doctor of Philosophy.

Mari Spirito

Mari Spirito is Executive Director and Curator of Protocinema, a cross-cultural art organization commissioning and presenting site-aware exhibitions around the world, since 2011. She curated public talks for Beijing Art Summit, 2019; was faculty for Independent Curators International (ICI) Curatorial Intensive, Bangkok, 2018; Guest Curator, Alserkal Arts Foundation Public Commission, Dubai, with Hale Tenger, in 2018. From 2013 - 2018 Spirito programed Conversations for both Art Basel and Art Basel Miami Beach; served as International Advisory Committee Member for the Inaugural High Line Plinth Commissions, New York, 2017; was Curator and Director of Alt Art Space, Bomonti, Istanbul from 2015 to 2017; independently curated “On the Nature of Justice” exhibition and talk for Onassis Cultural Center, Athens, 2017, Advisor to the 2nd Mardin Biennial, Turkey, 2012; and Director of 303 Gallery New York, 2000 - 2012. She is on the Board of Participant, Inc, New York, and holds a BFA from Massachusetts College of Art, Boston.

Fatma Çolakoğlu

Fatma Çolakoğlu earned her degree in film directing and film history at Emerson College
and her MA in theater directing from Goldsmiths College. She initiated İstanbul Modern's film program. She has been working as Pera Museum’s film and video curator and head of communication programming since 2008. At the same time, she curated Pera Museum’s film and video programs. In 2016, she curated ‘’Katherine Behar: Data’s Entry ”exhibition and” Bring Your Own Beamer ”pop-up video exhibition projects at Pera Museum with Ulya Soley. Çolakoğlu has been the Assistant Director of Research and Programs at SALT since September 2018.

Ayça Çiftçi

Ayça Çiftçi is a faculty member in the Cinema Department at Istanbul Bilgi University. She teaches courses in creative documentary production, urban filmmaking, video experimentation, and film grammar.

Following her Bachelor's degree in Cinema and Master's in Cultural Studies, she completed her doctorate in Media Arts at Royal Holloway, University of London in 2015. She has taught various theoretical and practical courses in cinema at different universities and institutions, and has advised on numerous short film projects. Her short films, *Impressions from a Summer* and *At That Time*, have been screened at various platforms including the Istanbul Film Festival, Ankara Film Festival, Istanbul Modern, Documentarist, Cologne Tupischturkish Film Festival, and Berlin HIVE Short Film Days. Her feature film project, *Saadet*, currently in development, won an award at *Meetings on the Bridge*. She has been a writer and editorial board member of Altyazı Cinema Magazine since 2006.