Today we’d like to introduce you to Advik Beni.
Advik, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
Growing up in post-apartheid South Africa has been an extremely interesting and convoluted period – tied in with so many complexities. But these surroundings have shaped me in more ways than I can imagine.
Inadvertently it has led me down the path of the arts, initially as a space for catharsis and now as a space of introspection and unraveling of our traumas. I was a triple major at the University of Cape Town, specializing in English, Film History and Screen Production. I realized that the infrastructure for any sort of filmmaking that lies outside of the Westernised model of production was slim or reserved for the most privileged in the country. I got the opportunity to continue my studies – an MFA at CalArts and took the chance to continue my craft and find new ways of creating that were true to my roots. Ironically, coming to LA for this MFA program allowed for ways of creating outside of the Westernised model and finding a way to express myself that does not assimilate, but instead basks in our own uniqueness.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I think first and foremost, I would love to think of myself as an artist – but who knows what that even means anymore? As of now, my main medium is film, however, I sit here now with three 40 x 60 inch incomplete canvases wishing that I could seclude myself and just paint. But we move.
I like to create film work that is based on an oral sensibility. In practice, this entails a filmmaking that has a free flow between all involved – blurring the lines of production and roles. I always say my work is more so about the process than the product. In a way the theme, idea or concept starts off and the process can take over – meaning that the end product is always shifting – it may become a film, a painting, a piece of writing and so on. I choose to emphasize the process over the product because most of the time this is where the most tangible effect of creating can be felt on a community and people.
My short film ‘Ilanga Alikho’ (The Sun is Missing’) – a film I made with my friend Maqhawe Junior Madonsela and my brother Nirav Beni – will be screening at the San Sebastián International Festival. Recently I have also been accepted as a Sundance Ignite Fellow which has been an incredible experience. At the moment, I am currently working on my first feature film titled ‘mother, you have not died yet, but you will and when you do, you will finally be alive again’—a hybrid experimental documentary about grief, violence and displacement within the Indian diaspora in post-apartheid South Africa.
Where we are in life is often partly because of others. Who/what else deserves credit for how your story turned out?
Mother & father.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: advikbeni
