EP.21 - Demelza Kooij

Demelza Kooij is an artist, filmmaker, and lecturer. Her work is presented at film festivals, museums, art exhibitions, and conferences. She has previously taught at Edinburgh College of Art and worked at the Scottish Documentary Institute. Her latest film 'Wolves From Above' won the Jury Prize at the 57th Ann Arbor Film Festival.

I first met Demelza in the winter of 2014, when attending a workshop she was running on making experimental film. During the sessions she deconstructed her film Graminoids (2014) as a way to demonstrate the way she worked. This was fascinating as it was the first time I was able to talk to an artist in detail about their creative and technical processes. It was also the first time I was able to see what Final Cut Pro was capable of doing. At that point I was using Windows Movie Maker for basic editing and Audacity for sound design. So seeing the possibilities that this software could offer, in terms of working with images and audio, was a game changer.  

​I talked to Demelza about a few of her films, including Wolves from Above. We discussed her approach to presenting the work as a single channel installation at Alchemy Film and Arts, projected on the ceiling and viewed from the ground - the photo on the left was taken the morning after the public preview. 

Demelza makes reference to various films and filmmakers in the interview: 

Darwin's Nightmare (2004, Hubert Sauper) 
Tarnation (2003, Jonathan Caouette)
Forever (2006, Heddy Honigmann)
Vivan Las Antipodas (2011, Viktor Kossakovsky)

As someone very much at the early stages of their artistic journey I find it satisfying to talk to people like Demelza about their work. It is fascinating to hear how ideas develop, meander and change before forming into shape, how she works within a place, with people, and the elements she has to have within a project to spark the creative process.  

You can see film excerpts and trailers and read more about Demelza on her website.  
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