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After the Beforetimes

In April 2020, I reached out to over thirty artists who I have met over the past decade in different parts of the world and at different times. I asked them if they wanted to participate in a collaborative film which documents working artists today. Ten of them committed to this film project and they started filming their daily lives and routines between April and July 2020.

The result is an audio-visual collage created by artists who are based in the US, Canada, the UK and Germany. Even though the film brings together various voices, approaches, media and ideas, all artists participating share the drive to keep making work, to keep digging deeper into who they are and what it means to be making art today.

Even though the majority of the footage was shot between April and July 2020, some material was recorded in 2019 with the intention to draw a distinction between the 'Beforetimes' and the 'Aftertimes'. After the Beforetimes does not simply document working artists today, but it also offers a reflection on our current times with their partisan politics, societal division, an ongoing pandemic, and the personal toll these issues take on each of us.

  • Viktor Witkowski
    Director
  • Viktor Witkowski
    Writer
  • Brian Bulfer
    Key Cast
  • Steven Day
    Key Cast
  • Heide Fasnacht
    Key Cast
  • Andrea Garcia
    Key Cast
  • Kaitlyn Hahn
    Key Cast
  • Anja Heymann
    Key Cast
  • Mazen Khaddaj
    Key Cast
  • John Lord
    Key Cast
  • Alma Visscher
    Key Cast
  • Anastasia Warren
    Key Cast
  • Project Type:
    Documentary, Feature
  • Runtime:
    1 hour 9 minutes 48 seconds
  • Completion Date:
    March 1, 2021
  • Production Budget:
    10,000 USD
  • Country of Origin:
    United States
  • Country of Filming:
    Canada, France, Germany, United Kingdom, United States
  • Language:
    English, German
  • Shooting Format:
    Digital
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16:9
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    No
  • Student Project:
    No
  • Digital Cinema Package:
    Unavailable
  • On Art Film Festival
    Warsaw
    Poland
    World Premiere
    Official Selection
Director Biography - Viktor Witkowski

Viktor Witkowski is a painter and filmmaker. He was born in Poland and grew up in Germany where he graduated from the Hochschule für Bildende Künste Braunschweig (HBK Braunschweig, Germany) with a combined master’s degree in Studio Art, Art History and Art Education in 2006. The same year, he immigrated to the US where he earned an MFA in Visual Arts from Rutgers University in 2010. He currently splits his time between Vermont (US) and Leipzig (DE). When he is not working on paintings and films, he teaches as lecturer in Dartmouth College’s Studio Art Department in New Hampshire.

Viktor Witkowski’s writing and criticism has been published on Hyperallergic, the Painters’ Table, in The Brooklyn Rail and the New Art Examiner. His films and videos have been screened at numerous festivals in the US and abroad including such venues as the Pergamon Museum in Berlin, the York Art Gallery in York (UK), the LA Underground Film Forum in Los Angeles, The Artists Forum Festival of the Moving Image in New York City, and the AVIFF Cannes Art Film Festival in Cannes (France). In addition, his paintings have been featured in solo and group shows across the US, as well as in France and Germany.

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Director Statement

My paintings and films address the representation of history, domestic as well as global conflicts and the impact these have on the individual. At the same time, I ask what the possibilities of painting and film are in the face of unsettling, yet socially relevant topics. Is there a space for poetics when dealing with the darker issues in life?

My work is driven by a deeply personal agenda: after martial law had been lifted in Poland in 1983, my parents decided to flee to what used to be West Germany in order to escape uncertainty and oppression. Ultimately, my work shows that politics and history are anything but theoretical constructs. On the contrary, these conditions affect people's minds, hearts and everyday lives.