Synopsis: Dutch kinetic artist Christiaan Zwanikken resurrects the deceased local wildlife by reanimating the skeletal remains with servomotors and robotic engineering. He breeds these new species in a 400 yr. old monastery in a village in Portugal that has been restored from ruins, to become his family's home, an artists’ workshop and nature preserve. Filmed entirely in Portugal, Convento’s camera is almost perpetually in motion, tracking through the monastery and its landscape, transporting the audience into the daily lives of these extraordinary people. Each family member simultaneously nourishes the coexistence of art and nature, documented through a series of connected micro-narratives. [Synopsis courtesy of SXSW]
The Zwanikken clan story is not your Daddy’s family tales. Back in 1980 Geraldine and Kees (ballerina and photographer respectively) needed a creative spark to their battery, and together with their two children (Christiaan and Louis) they abandoned Holland for a decrepit convent in a remote Portugu...
Read More »Jarred Alterman's "Convento" is a documentary about art, but it's also an art object. Profiling a trio of creatively inclined relatives holed up in a centuries-old monastery in southeastern Portugal, Alterman showcases their ominous, mystifying and hugely innovative work by reflect...
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