“I often want to jolt the viewer into experiencing uncharted paths in someone’s psyche.”
Name
Alice Cornelia
Profession
Director/Writer
Website
Where are you from?
Warrington, United Kingdom
Your style in 3 words?
Tactile, visual, immersive
Your weakness? Your strength?
Self-doubt / Reflection
When did you decide to become a director and writer?
I’ve always been a visual person and drawn to visual materials. I guess it felt like a significant step when I started at the Glasgow school of Art in 2015 and started to really explore what kind of work I wanted to make as an artist, why I wanted to and how. My first year there was hard but valuable, asking important questions that pushed my own practice.
Do you choose your art form, or does the form choose you?
I used to be a painter but my first time directing my first funded short film in 2020 established filmmaking as a vice to communicate in visual ways that I couldn’t otherwise. The whole process felt exhilarating and innate. Stimulating my brain like no other. I found it really got under my skin in a way the painting hadn’t before.
What do you find most fascinating about the creative process?
Sometimes I can make work that later, say in two months or 6, will communicate emotions to me that I couldn’t grasp at the time of creating it.
A few words about your favorite creation?
personal, internal, sensory
What surprised you most about your first art shows?
People cared to ask me about it.
Someone else’s work that inspired or inspires you…
I’m particularly inspired by the works of Lynne Ramsay, Sophie Littman, Krzysztof Kieslowski, Terrence Malick. They inspire a desire to create films that are deeply experienced and to explore the intimate union of indifferent images to the eye, but charge our unconscious innards – when your body registers something before your mind – always chasing that feeling in my stomach when viewing someone else’s work.
Who would you like to work with someday and why?
I’d like to eventually work with community groups within the medium of film, just questioning the role of a director and pushing the value of film and how it can be used to encourage personal agency, empower, inform and connect.
A new project coming up or an idea you want to work on?
I’ve written a new short film script inspired by my mum’s relationship with her grandmother and moths. I’m now eager to make another funded short film but longer and more complex drama so I’m currently applying for funding. In the film, the main character Jude struggles to come to terms with her maternal relationship following her mother’s death. She begins to have traumatic flashbacks from one of her mother’s mental health episodes when she was nine. However, the recall of these memories has been inhabited by a stunning creature!
Finish the sentence „More important than my career is…“
Making work that makes sense to me. Work that contributes something valuable to an understanding of myself and if others could feel validated or somehow relate to it.
2023: Where are we going?
Downhill
Do you think about time as an artist?
Always, especially reflecting on past things and their relation to the present. Love exploring non-linear narratives and challenging our perception of time. I often want to jolt the viewer into experiencing uncharted paths in someone’s psyche.
When the going gets tough…
Talk to other artists! Think about what you’ve achieved so far.
Put on your future vision glasses: What direction is our generation moving in, what will our world look like in 50 years?
Hot. Dangerous and scary, very depressing.
What would you do if you could change the World?
Freak out! Making art more accessible, less about weird cliques and ‘higher art’. It would be great to see more awareness of how creativity can be beneficial to our well-being, connection and in order to change what we see as valuable from an early age.
What does freedom mean when it comes to art?
The process of developing a strong relationship with your inner self and thoughts, then being brave and putting them into action, materializing it!
If the universe is everything and it’s expanding, what is it expanding into?
Infinite nothingness. We shouldn’t worry about that as I think our brains can’t even comprehend – we are a tiny part of something massive.
Tell us about your future plans…
I’m currently working in the third sector in Glasgow, UK as a filmmaker/photographer and hope to develop my skills and work as a filmmaker working with young people and explore ways this medium could be impactful. As mentioned I’m hoping to secure funding to direct my next short film script and build on my experiences as a director with a more complex experimental drama.
Your city’s favorite spots?
I’m currently based in Glasgow – SaltSpace! SaltSpace is a non-profit cooperative in Glasgow aimed at supporting emerging artists with a gallery space and studios. I was a founding member of this organization in 2019 and is an important, transparent, and artist-run collective working hard to make opportunities for emerging artists available and the art industry more inclusive. Check it out: saltspacecoop.co.uk
A book that everyone should read…
Thin Places by Kerri ní Dochartaigh
Last but not least: what is your favorite Song?
Changes all the time but right now – Promises by Cleo Sol
One last statement please: „Wood or stone, gold or art?“
stone gold
Your #…?
@al.cornelia
