Elías Querejeta Zine Eskola

The highlands of Granada, Spain, 2027. Among sheep, ruins and drones, a student and two shepherds meet and connect. Their lives entangle as they explore the history of a homestead that appears and vanishes at will.

I wanted to make a film about polyamory, because I firmly believed that I would love all partners equally. As a relationship became more intense, the foundations I wanted to explore began to conflict with the reality I was experiencing, and the direction of the film changed.

During a dynastic crisis in 14th century Portugal, the 10 year old Beatriz enters into a forced marriage to become the country’s new queen. At the Monastery of Sancti Spiritus in Toro, where the tomb of Beatriz is located, this story is re-enacted, re-imagined, and recreated with children of the same age. As their imagination is allowed to roam free, a different way to interact with their country’s history opens up.

El tercer paisaje / The Third Landscape is a film project that has as its protagonist the fungus that made the painted forest of Oma sick, the work that the Basque artist Agustín Ibarrola carried out in the 80s in the province of Bizkaia. This artwork belongs to the Land Art movement, which is mainly characterized by its ephemeral nature. Within this current, artists leave their works exhibited at the mercy of weather conditions and other elements alien to human will.

A strange weapon of optical complexity is able to project an enormous dazzling light over the territory. Precisely aimed, the ray can cause the spread of colossal heat, enough to destroy everything. The night is extinguished, the earth burns, the creatures run away groping towards the depths of the world. In the dark holes of the earth the space expands enough to imagine a refuge where another imaginary may appear.

The making of a soldier in Peru. A group of young men, some of them teenagers, voluntarily enlists in a rigorous military program within the Peruvian Armed Forces. They are driven by their desire to engage in an ongoing armed conflict in the VRAEM, an area with military intervention framed by a 'war on drugs' policy. They aspire to become ‘men of war’ and embark on a transformative journey from hopeful adventurers into soldiers. Amidst the violence in the secluded military environment in Peru, intimate moments unfold beyond a prejudiced gaze, where compassion and care blossom among them.

João stars in a biopic about Liberada, a gender-nonconforming figure persecuted by the Inquisition. After the director is mysteriously paralyzed, João faces haunting dreams and struggles to honor Liberada’s story.

A baby is bathed by its mother, who sings: “When I was a young girl…”. Later, a little girl’s voice will pick up the thread: “When I’ll be an old lady…”. Between the two, the film sketches an anthropology of all the different games, wonders, and plays with auditory perceptions that children carry out with water in all its shapes (baths, sprinklers, lakes…). But other dimensions are hinted at: an exploration of its meanings for mankind, a kaleidoscope of its movements, textures, and reflections, a spectrum of the scales in which it is to be contemplated. (Nathan Letoré)

After nights of heavy partying, a trans performer goes to the Botanical Garden of Lisbon to get sober again.

An adaptation of “Sea Foam”, a chapter from Cesare Pavese’s “Dialoghi con Leucò” published in 1947. The ancient Greek poet Sappho and the nymph Britomartis meet beside the sea and have a conversation about love and death. Sappho is said to have thrown herself into the ocean from lovesickness. Britomartis apparently tumbled off a cliff and into the water while fleeing from a man. Together, the two discuss the stories and images that have emerged around them to try and understand, at least for a moment, the bittersweet nature of desire.

My father only used a camera once in his life. Thirty years later, he asked me to digitise the material he had filmed. I was wondering what he remembers. Created from an impulse to rethink and rewatch personal archive footage, the film explores memory and its relation to documentation and non-institutional archive practices. Connecting politics with intimate spaces, the documentary questions both the influence of war on private archives and the role of gardens as places of new begginings.

In the ruins of the Disibodenberg monastery, the voice of Hildegard von Bingen sneakes through the walls. As the day goes by, the space empties of people, and with the arrival of the night, a vision emerges.

Alone in the mountains: Olivia, her Father, and their home. By the foothills, a slaughterhouse, where Father works. When Father disappears Olivia descends the mountains in search of him.

A hairdresser's shop in Madrid crowded with people who come to see and touch a replica of the Virgin of Quinche. A priest proposes to take the statue to a church downtown. The story continues when the replica of the Virgin is returned to the barbershop after an angry crowd disagrees with the way the priest handles things. So, I decide to write a letter to the priest. Offer him a deal he can't refuse.

In a village in the Extremadura province of Spain, where bullfighting and the Catholic faith have long been a way of life, 16-year-old Tristán is training to become a bullfighter. His mother silently but anxiously observes his preparations. He practices graceful moves and posture, but he is plagued by insecurity and fear of the fight to come. TO DIE BEFORE DYING tells a personal story about a controversial reality of the 21st century.

Authorities have prohibited access to a forest on the outskirts of the city. Strange vegetation has infested the area, and those who have been questioned report sightings of rare species, human-sized birds, or figures that appear and disappear. Despite the restrictions, several people decide to visit the place. Once there, they coexist and play without fear of the warnings. Little by little, reality begins to distort, blending with their memories, dreams, and fantasies.

Video installation study between landscape, a woman, and the portrait of both.