Artists in residence

Erenik Beqiri studied at the Academy of Arts, Tirana where he graduated with a Master degree in Film Directing. His thesis was Seed Money, a short film written by Jim Uhls (Fight Club).

He has participated in the Sarajevo Talent Campus as a screenwriter, where he developed the short script Reverse which was produced a year later for the Sarajevo City of Film. Reverse collected awards for best film at the Drama International Short Film Festival and Cinematic Achievement award at Thessaloniki International Short Film Festival.

In 2013 he wrote and directed the short film Alphonso which screened in festivals such as Vancouver International Film Festival and Brussels ISFF, among others. His next short film Bon Appétit was nominated for Méliès D’Argent at Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival and was also selected in Haapsalu, Dokufest, Lund and many more.

His lastest short film The Van was the first Albanian film to be in the official competition in Cannes Film Festival and many others like Melbourne International Film Festival, Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival, Sarajevo Film Festival. The film is also one of the ten films shortlisted for the Oscar 2021 The Best Live-Action Shorts.

His feature film project After Dark was part of Meditalent, Torino ScritptLab, and the first Albanian project to be selected for the Cinéfondation Residence of Cannes Film Festival.

Erenik Beqiri films’ showcase the inner struggles of the characters as they confront the socio-political space they inhabit, ultimately coming down to unsettling decisions that define them as comic, tragic or grotesque portraits of society.

Julien Béramis is a multidisciplinary artist. For him, theater is an essential space of exploration, instilling in him the discipline necessary to achieve total freedom of expression. He has notably performed in works such as Les Nègres by Jean Genet, Venus Hottentot by Suzan-Lori Parks, and Caligula by Albert Camus.

Cinema also offers him the opportunity to refine his art through films like Paris, je t’aime, Omar m’a tuer, Les Derniers jours du monde, Le Rêve Français, as well as the series Tropiques Criminels.

Over time, his engagement in dance, writing Vìré, filmmaking Atopias: The Homeless Wanderer, and music LÊG has not only broadened his creative horizon but also deepened his understanding and perception of the world. Originally from and residing in Guadeloupe, Julien is particularly inspired by the collective memories that connect the island’s inhabitants to their volcanic landscape, a place teeming with complex and deeply rooted stories.

By exploring these Caribbean narratives and mythologies through artistic expression, Julien Béramis seeks to summon and reclaim these missing fragments of memory, reinterpreting them in our contemporary world to better understand our relationship to it. His work aspires to transcend cultural specificities, demonstrating that rooting oneself in a local identity can serve as a bridge to a broader and more universal understanding of the world.

INTERVIEW

A residency in Montmartre, at the Cité internationale des arts, how is it? 

“Actually, it’s quite unreal. Living on top of a hill overlooking Paris, in the middle of a hidden garden with a special atmosphere, you quickly feel very lucky to be there.
The configuration of the premises and the residence has made it very easy to exchange with the other artists, some of whom I now count among my friends, and with whom we have many conversations, often over coffee or a pastis.”

What are your current projects?

“At the moment, I am working on several projects at the same time. 

I am continuing my experimental and sculptural work, for example, by taking an interest in the circulation of electric current in a gold thread embroidery, in the distillation of cigüe from the city’s gardens, or in producing functional neon lights from crystal waste.

The exhibition Bad Girls Do It Well was also the opportunity to present the first essays related to my research on bismuth crystallization or Fitzroy’s barometer system, as well as the beginning of a collaboration with Rebecca Topakian, resident of workshop G1.”

BIOGRAPHY

“Sabotage considered as one of the fine arts.

During her studies at Villa Arson, Jeanne Berbinau Aubry incorporated a varied series of microknowledge in chemistry, biology, physics, etc. This appetite for knowledge was not carried this way by a pure desire for science, a desire to contemplate some celestial ideas outside the world, but by the almost inverse obsession to derail all things in his direct surroundings. His practice is the closest to a systematized sabotage (aesthetic) enterprise. Jeanne Berbinau Aubry’s interest in electrical circuits or the process of crystallization was not to understand the mechanisms of the universe but to create a magical infernal lantern or a neon that conspired to its own extinction. His libido sciendi is above all a libido delendi (in beauty). And his ambition in this field is constantly expanding as his latest projects involve the roof of the Opéra Garnier and plants transformed into luminaires. To both of us, Paris! And to both of us Nature!”

Patrice Blouin, 2016

“Each of my projects is based on the dissection of phenomena as a pretext to dig deeper and deeper into my approach to cognition. These phenomena allow me to deploy protean materials that go through dance/performance, drawing, video/photographic images and that I will connect in order to define the quality of a language, highlight these issues and find the expressive specificity of the project. This search for phenomena is a challenge that allows me to create a link between an experience of the world and the need for the artistic gesture that inhabits me.

The territory of the body in a space and its context is the subject of an inexhaustible interest in me, which at the same time serves as a reference point for me to constantly re-engage the work and affirm its positioning within what already exists.

My physical practice is based on immediate reactions and a sensitive hyper-availability to allow myself to be grasped and crossed by a certain experience of the present while seeking to detach myself from a social construction and therefore from a judgment. From there, the transgression comes into play and opens the way to delay, surprise and simply to thwart preconceived ideas. My work navigates within the limits of belonging, whether social, physical, historical or identity, and draws its strength from (fertile) destabilization, vulnerability, alchemy, humour, sincerity and sensuality.

Always immersed in the artistic world, since the daughter of a visual artist, dance has become my main mode of expression and I have studied it in several institutions, including TrinityLaban in London and the e.x.e.r.c.e. master’s degree in Montpellier. To continue to nurture my practice, it is essential for me to maintain a relationship between choreographer and performer, whether in my own projects or for other artists.”