Director of Photography
Journey with the musicians of the Berlin Philharmonic and their conductor Sir Simon Rattle on a breakneck concert tour of six metropolises across Asia: Beijing, Seoul, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Taipei and Tokyo. Their artistic triumph onstage belies a dynamic and dramatic life backstage. The orchestra is a closed society that observes its own laws and traditions, and in the words of one of its musicians is, “an island, a democratic microcosm – almost without precedent in the music world - whose social structure and cohesion is not only founded on a common love for music but also informed by competition, compulsion and the pressure to perform to a high pitch of excellence... .” Never before has the Berlin Philharmonic allowed such intimate and exclusive access into its private world.
Director
In 1988, Albert Venzago set out to cross Africa on a Vespa. After miles in the blistering heat, it broke down in a remote village in Benin. There he encountered Mahounon, one of the most influential voodoo priests of West Africa. Abandoning his planned trip, Venzago set out instead on an odyssey through the world of African voodoo, to which he and his camera gained extraordinary access. Venzago followed Mahounon with his camera for nearly ten years, filming secret Voodoo ceremonies and sacrificial rituals. He witnessed Mahounon’s extraordinary search for a successor to lead the cult, and he watched as the anointed eleven-year old boy, Gounon, was schooled in black and white magic, rituals, and the intricate workings of the Fa, or Voodoo oracle. Venzago’s camera evokes the religious ecstasy of these ceremonies as well as their otherworldly atmosphere. His photographs illuminate this mysterious and potent Voodoo culture and religion.
