Stefan Pavlovic

Artist Statement

I stuttered heavily as a child, causing an interest in language, which I see as a body of water: numerous sources, leaks, inflows, and outflows, in all directions - in a collective effort to reach the recesses of memory. My three languages - English, Dutch, and Bosnian - each carry a different amount of stuttering, providing a unique relationship with each. I use cinema, my fourth language, as a means of encountering people, places, histories, and languages. I work primarily in experimental documentary film. I have wondered – how can I make films through intimate means? My method ‘filming through spending time’, fosters connection marked by a desire to understand, to listen and pay attention. I work on ways to use the camera to evoke the process of bonding - from filming intimacy to filming intimately - while acknowledging its influence on reality.

A screenshot from my current film-project.

Bio

Stefan Pavlovic (b. 1989) is an award-winning filmmaker currently based in Amsterdam. His debut feature film Looking for Horses (2021) has been screened at over forty international film festivals, and won fifteen prizes, among others, the Burning Lights Competition at Visions du Reel, Jury Prize at Sarajevo Film Festival, Grand Prix at RIDM, Best Film at Kasseler Dokfest. Stefan was awarded the Prins Bernhard Documentary Stipend in 2021 and was selected for the Berlinale Talents program in 2022. He is a programmer at the Eastern Neighbours Film Festival and at the International Film Festival Assen, in the Netherlands. Stefan received his BA in film directing at Art Center College of Design in Los Angeles and his MA at the Netherlands Film Academy in Artistic Research in and through Cinema.

www.stefanpavlovic.com