Stuart Urban and his camera
Short-term memory does not apply here – in Europe. Some of our parents, all of our grandparents have lived through a war, at times, both the First and Second World War.
The streets we live in, the parks we walk through, the rivers we (maybe) swim in, the fields where our crops are grown have all seen human lives sacrificed.
Driving through France down to Italy with Andrew in September 2005, fresh from being awarded out Master of Art degrees, going home (Florence is our chosen home), we drove through immense fields of stunning wheat – an immensity that filled the eyes up to the horizon. A silence yet still lingered over them: this is where the hard line was, in 1914-1918.
I always think that I am a granddaughter of survivors – if my grandfather hadn’t survived the trek across the Albanian mountains, the typhus fever, and the war as a young man, barely a teenager, my father would not have been born, and then, I would not have been born either. In that way, aren’t we all proof of our ancestors’ survivals?
When Diaspora happens then, a curiosity is born too - for I may know where I was born, and what my environment is, but where are my genetic, story-telling roots? Inevitably, we look to our parents, our closest link to our grandparents and to our ancestors, for information. Voyages may occur in an attempt to retrace the exodus backwards, from where we belong to where we belonged, in order to clarify an enigma.
And that’s what Stuart did – followed his father's footsteps back to where Harry (Garri S. Urban) was born, documenting the revisiting of a present, where the past that shaped Harry folded out. Looking for the jigsaw puzzle pieces that told the story of the way Harry lived, survived to live again, a story that created a gentleman whose character is deeply impressed on all who met him, and who knew him.
Stuart Urban is a film director. The camera has been an extension to his hand ever since he was a young boy, his debut happening when he was 13, at the Cannes Film Festival, with a short film:
The Virus of War (1972).
History intrigues Stuart: he went on to study it at Oxford, and many of his films and documentaries develop around what I wish to call “present history” rather than “current affairs” – the events of the past whose effects are still felt today, and even, whose results we are, directly, or indirectly.
Harry Urban spoke many languages, walked many paths, and loved many people. He was an imposing yet warm figure. Harry had time and attention for everybody, a laugh that shook a persons heart, and a voice that melted ice when he’d sing “Podmoskovnye Vechera.”
His story is full of colour, secrets, bridges burned, and bridges rebuilt – which Stuart captured in this search for his own “present history” – resulting in the documentary film named after Harry’s autobiographical book:
Tovarisch, I Am Not Dead (2007)
www.tovarisch.net
(click from our links to go directly to the website, which contains more fascinating information and stories!)
The Italian premiere will be screened on the 8th of June, at Biografilm, Bologna.
The Editorial team of ArtSEEN journal wishes Stuart all the best in this and other premiers and international competitions!
Because the streets we walk on, remind us of what has been, for us to be.
Rachel Whiteread 'Untitled 'Six Spaces'
