Alla Kovgan

RÉALISATRICE, MONTEUSE, PROGRAMMATRICE, ARTISTE INTERDISCIPLINAIRE

Née à Moscou (URSS, actuelle Russie) en 1973, Alla Kovgan a partagé son temps entre la Russie et les Etats-Unis depuis 1996 : réalisations de films, installations, performances scéniques, enseignement et programmation de festivals.
En 2008, elle collabore avec le réalisateur anglais David Hinton et la chorégraphe zimbabwéenne Nora Chipaumire à la réalisation d’un court métrage qui est sélectionné dans plus de 120 festivals et présenté au MOMA, au Louvre et au Tate Modern. Il a reçu 30 prix en tant que fiction, documentaire, ou vidéo d’art et a été diffusée à la télévision en Europe et aux Etats-Unis.
Au cours des cinq dernières années, Alla a co-réalisé, écrit et monté deux longs métrages documentaires (dont Traces of the trade nominé pour les Emmy Awards). Elle a également monté My Perestroïka (2010), sélectionné à Sundance.
En 1999, elle intègre la compagnie Kinodance (www.kinodance.org), qui crée des spectacles et installations mêlant les disciplines artistiques.
Depuis 2000, Alla assure la programmation du Saint-Petersbourg International Dance Festival. Elle contribue également à la programmation du Balagan Experimental Film and Video Series à Boston (USA), où elle vit depuis 1996.
Elle est une des trois membres du jury Labo au Festival de Courts métrages de Clermont-Ferrand 2012 (France).

COURTS MÉTRAGES
1998
Belongings

1999
Aching

2000
Surface

2003
Arcus / Touch

2008
Nora, sélection Labo Clermont-Fd 2009

2010
New London Calling

DOCUMENTAIRES
2002
African Dance : Sand, Drum and Shostakovich

2007
Movement (R)Evolution Africa », sélection Festival de Montréal / Traces of the Trade : A Story From the Deep North, sélection Festival de Sundance

2010
My Perestroika, sélection Festivals de Sundance et Rotterdam

INSTALLATIONS ET PERFORMANCES (Compagnie Kinodance)
2005
Secret Streams / Crow’s Nest

2007-2010
Denizen

2008-2010
Behemoth et Fuse

2009
The Refractive Kinescope

2011
Seekers

Source: Clermont-Ferrand 2012
www.clermont-filmfest.com/index.php?m=25

ALLA KOVGAN is a film and video maker from Moscow (Russia) who has lived and worked in Boston since 1996. Her 16 mm films have been screened at the film festivals around the US, Canada, and Europe. Her first film « belongings » is recognized as one of the Best of the Boston Underground Film Festival for « really exquisite poetic moments of visuals and sound » (Boston Phoenix). Alla’s mediums of expression and exploration encompass short films, multimedia performances, interactive video projections and other image/sound/body installations in collaboration with dancers and musicians. In summer 2000, Alla along with Paula Jose Jones Performance Works dance company traveled to St. Petersburg, Russia. She is currently working on the film about experiences of Russian and American dancers during this trip. Alla is a member of Pixonik Labs and Outsideart Collaborative.

Since 2000, Alla has been teaching and curating dance film and avant-garde cinema worldwide and acts as an International Director of St. Petersburg Dance Film Festival KINODANCE (http://www.kinodance.org) and Balagan Film Series in Boston (http://www.coolidge.org/balagan). Alla is also a founding member of an intermedia collective KINODANCE Company in Boston. Among Alla’s most recent endeavors is co-directing and editing « Traces of the Trade: a Story from the Deep North » produced by Katrina Browne (http://www.tracesofthetrade.org); co-producing with Russian filmmaker Efim Reznikov « Terpsychore’s Captives II », a feature documentary about Bill T. Jones and a Russian prima ballerina Natalia Balakhnicheva; and working with Kinodance Company, on a new intermedia performance « Denizen » that will premiere in May 2007 as a part of Bank of America Celebrity Series (http://www.kinodance.org/).


Among the works completed are:

Films

aching (10 min, 16mm, color, with Alissa Cordone, Dec 1999)
Boston Underground Film Festival 2000 (Boston, USA) East Art Gallery Film Festival 2000 (Balatonfured, Hungary) « Misguided Again », multimedia performance, Mobius Gallery (Boston, USA, 1999) « Shorts before the feature » series sponsored by LEV foundation, Coolidge Corner Cinema, (Boston, USA, for one week in April 2000)

Description:
Aching came out of a silent protest against violence and war as a way for conflict resolution. Through the union of sound, light and movements of a human body the film tells an imaginative story of a woman experienced a state of being a target on the bridge. The film explores relativity of a single moment in the context of the human universe. It stars modern dancer, Alissa Cardone. « Aching » is layered with complex sounds created by members of Saturnalia, a Boston experimental jazz group.

belongings (21 min, S8 to 16mm, color, experimental, 1998)
The Best of Boston Underground Film Festival 1999 (Boston, USA) Honorable Mention of Anitmatter Film Festival 1999 (Victoria, BC, Canada) Numerous screenings at local venues including Zeitgeist Gallery (Cambridge MA, USA), Jacques Club (Boston, MA, USA) and Clara Wainwright Studio (Allston MA, USA)

Description:
Belongings are objects that a human being carries through life such as memories, experiences and feelings. The film explores an episode in the life of a woman who is a stranger to her surroundings. The heroine finds peace only in an abandoned studio that guards a mysterious construction of reflective materials. The reflections inspire her memories of dear people, books and paintings, challenge the heroine’s being and provoke yearning for connection, harmony, peace and niche to belong. « Belongings » is a hybrid of visual mediums – 16mm-super8mm, video (projections), and original sound created by Jonathan LaMaster, Vic Rawlings, James Coleman, John Voight, Liz Tonne, and Daniel Carter.

vacuum (6 min, super-8, bw, 1997)

Description:
a student film about a human condition of a child stuck in the room with a TV set.

dizziness (4 min, super-8, bw, 1997)
Description:
the very first film, homage to Maya Deren.

Installation/Performances:

« Balaganchik » a two-day street performance within Scavenger Hunt (September 2000, Jamaica Plain, MA): 2 video feeds into 2 TV monitors of live performances by Jamaica Plain residents, musicians (Vic Ralwings (banjo), Jonathan Vincent (accordion), Katt Hernandez (violin) and dancers (Laura Fortune, Rachel Federmen Morales, Kristen Kissik). The participants created performances in response to the photographs of works by JP artists. The happening was videotaped and broadcast simultaneously.


« Surface » 10 min: 2 channel video projections with live percussion/ accordion/ violin choreographed by Alissa Cardone based on « The Diary of a Young Girl » by Ann Frank as a part of’Invitation’ by Outside Art Collective at AS220 Art and Performance Space, Providence, RI, USA, May 2000 and’Femme Fatale Frick Show’ at Green Street Studio, Cambridge, MA.

Interactive Live Video Projections by Pixonik Labs (Alla Kovgan and Jeff Silva): 3 channel video source amalgamated into a single channel video projection along with live performances by experimental jazz musicians and modern dancers (Daniel Carter, Roy Campbell, William Parker, Jonathan LaMaster and Saturnalia, Nicola Hawkins and others) at different venues: Galapagos Art and Performance Space and Pink Pony Art Space (NYC, May 200), Old Baptist Church (Cambridge MA, March 2000), Bad Girrls Studios Art Space (Jamaica Plain, MA, Dec 1998, Nov 1999), Zeitgeist Gallery (Cambridge, MA Aug. 1999).

« Misguided Again » by Pixonik Labs 60 min: 3 channel video projection with live percussion/ theremin/ violin/ cello in response to the recent war in Yugoslavia (Mobius Gallery, Boston, Sept 1999)

« We Are All Targets » by Collateral Damage Collaborative (CDC) 45 min: a single channel video projection with slides in response to the recent war in Yugoslavia (Mobius Gallery, Boston, July 1999)



Links:
Misguided Again: http://world.std.com/~mobius/nlfa99/rhpixonik.html
Belongings in Canada: http://www.antimatter.ws/aprog25.html
We are all targets: http://208.201.46.13/vesti/default.asp
Paula Josa Jones Performance Works: http://www.paulajosajones.com/
Alissa Cardone: http://www.secretstars.com/dance.html
Saturnalia: http://www.sublingual.com




Source :
http://www.eurounderground.org/filmmaker/alla.html