Guest Lecture Jan Krawitz (Stanford University)

“Documentary Filmmaking and Ventriloquy: The Illusion of Objectivity”

Jan Krawitz perceives her role as a documentary filmmaker to be akin to that of a ventriloquist. The point of view of her films is expressed through a range of creative choices: casting, observational shooting, interview questions, and most importantly, editing. How does a nonfiction filmmaker telegraph her perspective through the film's narrative arc? In what way do the opening and closing scenes convey the film's "voice"? Using clips from her eclectic body of work, Krawitz will unravel the myth of objectivity in documentary film and pull back the curtain on the creative process.

Jan Krawitz, a Professor in the Department of Art & Art History at Stanford University, is a current Fulbright Scholar at the University of Graz. She has been producing, directing, and editing documentaries for many years. Her films have been screened at film festivals in the United States and abroad including Sundance, SXSW, the New York Film Festival, Edinburgh, London, and Visions du Réel. Many of her films have been broadcast on national public television in the United States and Big Enough was screened at the European Parliament. Her documentaries focus on an eclectic range of topics including the lives of dwarfs, women and body image, an altruistic kidney donor, drive-in movie theaters, and a travelling tent circus. Krawitz has been awarded artist residencies at Yaddo and at the Bogliasco Foundation in Italy. She was a fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard and she is currently a voting member of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences.

Poster