Artist Statement: I have been a filmmaker for a long time. I have an extensive personal archive, and have no issue either with using appropriated material or found footage. I see poetry films as films where poetry is one element among others, such as music, special effects, or graphics.
“You Live” developed during a time when I was feeling stuck- artistically, physically, mentally. It was also a long winter in Connecticut, a period when people hibernate and one can feel very isolated. Confronting aging (as a female) was part of it. Although originally looking for a poem, I happened on the excerpt from “the Diaries of Anaïs Nin” and it appealed, especially as I had footage from Antibes (in the South of France) that I shot a few months earlier. The empty cobblestone streets seen in cool winter light was a good fit and nice that it was the author’s country (although not the primary consideration).
The opening of the film has a sweet backstory – the dying flowers had been sent by a boyfriend to my daughter after they broke up. The young man was in a far-off country and she had gone off somewhere herself, but the flowers remained with me and seemed to become imbued with an exquisite subtle beauty as they aged. The French voice-over was added later and is my daughter Rebeka’s voice.
