filmmaker/artist

juan carlos zaldívar

artist statement

I work mostly with film and video. Human relationship with our bodies is at the center of all my work. So are the impermanence, transmutations and transcendences of the physical.

I like things or actions that deconstruct a process. I am deeply influenced by Butoh dance and by film animation (both of which deconstruct movement and time, respectively); the defining properties of negative space; the invisible. I am kindred to the work of Sankai Juku and The Brothers Quay. I am also influenced by some early surrealists, in particular Jean Cocteau and his sense of humor. I have always been fascinated by conceptual art. The pranks of Dalí and Buñuel as Dadaists in the 1920's were brilliant. I like chocolate cake.

I started my film career as a sound editor and designer. I love sound. However, during the last few years and until recently, most of my work has been silent, exploring instead the displacement of all the different elements of film (optics, performance etc).

I have been heavily influenced by science (physics and optics in particular); also by how these two elements are used in magic. I keep re-reading The Elegant Universe by Brian Greene. I am interested in unseen forces, like light, sound and magnetism; the things that move us in ways that may not be apparent. I'd like to think I have a sense a humor about all this.

The way people interact with art intrigues me. When people look at art their facial expressions mimic those they make when they are alone or when they were children. Some withdraw into some memory. Some become curious again.  I seek that exchange with the viewer.