Daniel Paez and Carolina Padilla
Spanish filmmaker
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1. Tell me something about your life and the educational background
We are Daniel Desiderio Páez Castillo and Carolina Padilla Villarraga, graphic and digital designers from Colombia. We have been creators, producers and collaborators in computer networks, videomakers and project co-authors of electronic art. Our interest in media art has motivated us to learn about development environments for the execution of projects and experimental narratives as Sintacti-k work-group.
Eventually, we collaborated with groups of animals rights activists, and for this reason some of recent works are focused on connection points between the human and the non-human animal.
2. When, how and why started you filming?
We “started to play” with cameras towards the end of the 90`s, while studying graphic design in Bogotá. Then we moved to Barcelona in order to continue our formation in Electronic Art, and discovered that digital videos are a very interesting context in which to develop ideas, as well as a way of discovering new strategies of production more related towards open and hipertextual languales.
3. What kind of subjects have your films?
As work and production format material, our proposals start from information extracted and interpreted from the mass media, establishing spaces of critical reflection against the media strategies and its contents.
Nowadays, we focus on the posing of projects, where the central topic is the relationship between humans and other animals and in contemporary societies.
4. How do you develop your films, do you follow certain principles, styles etc?
Usually we gather data related to some topic that is interesting for us, and try to develop a concept. Once the concept is ripe, we process all the materials in an experimental manner while the work is on progress, trying to leave the format open until the end, whether it is to creat a videoart project, an installation or anything that may suit the subject’s development.
5. Tell me something about the technical equipment you use.
We don’t like to base our ideas on the technical equipment available, because every idea needs a different solution. We enjoy processing the material digitally, and because of that, most of our equipment is planned to work this way. Basically, what we need is a camera, one or two computers and the necessary software for image and sound processing.
6. What are the chances of new media for the genre film/video in general and you personally?
To begin, we can say that the creative possibilities are “endless” with so many formats, production forms, distribution spaces, specializing software development, etc. We have found that the only “limit†is the data processing capacity. We are becoming used towards developing a subject as it unfolds, towards immediacy, and towards collaboration networks, etc. That is what has led us to believe in new media as the ideal environment to work. Perhaps, with the privatization of networks and the excessive control in its contents, these spaces are becoming control marketing strategies. It’s important to have a critical position.
7. How do you finance your films?
We have always tried to finance our own projects, whether it is through collaborations with other groups, other projects, other ideas. The interchange of resources is the basis of our work. The most important thing for our ideas is distribution, and that is why we have approached festivals such as this.
8. Do you work individually as a video artist/film maker or do you work in a team?
As base group we are the creators, producers and editors of every project, although in certain stages of production like research, performaces, technical details, etc., we always look for external collaborators.
In some concrete projects, we have been par of a bigger group.
9. Who or what has a lasting influence on your film/video making?
It’s diffiicult to specify our influences, surely, some currents might have recognizable currents of thought or aesthetic aspects (creative documentary, experimental cinema, live cinema, etc.) But what is most important is to emphasize that we find our information sources, our way of doing things and our most inffluent characters in daily life, that is the way we “read” the information that defines the profile of every project.
10. What are your future plans or dreams as a film/video maker?
We are focusing on the here and now. Our work stems out of our daily life. It’s difficult to think about the themes that might interest us in the future.