Freddie Kruv is born.
Belgian based film director and photographer.
Who am I?
During the past three years, bridging the weirdness of Covid Times, I was living and graduating in a new city, Brussels. Constrained by necessity, I was able to focus on my search for a suitable language that fits my artistic vision. This in itself was a journey with ups and downs. But during my bachelor degree studies in the audiovisual arts I came to accept that experimentation comes with chaos and unexpected limitations. Projects need to grow and evolve, and cannot be forced in fixed paths. With that acceptance, I find myself liberated to write and express in ways that weren't open to me before.
Even as a child, I have always been susceptible to sensory overload, music, televison, cinema, nature, social interactions, all left their impressions on me, building an inner world of imagination that is looking for a way out. I grew up in an environment where I had the privilege to be exposed to Hollywood and cult classics from a young age. This led to outlined crayon drawings, kindergarten storyboards, but lacking the appeal the teacher was looking for.
Happily this didn't bother my parents and realizing that I was looking for a language to express myself in, they enrolled me in out of school art classes, resulting in 2018 in an animation film degree. At the same time I spent my final secondary school years in the audiovisual programme of the Bruges art academy, already doing some photography and freelance art projects on the side. At 18, I was torn between photography and film, between professional or academic studies. With the support of my friends and family, I decided to go for the larger challenge the Film programme at Sint-Lukas, LUCA - School of Arts, Brussels.
My susceptibility to input from every source still persists today, but rather than being caged in an inner world, I now have ways to "output."
How is my dancing?
I’ve been called a jack-of-all-trades but I prefer the second part of that saying, master-of- none. I fully realize that I have only taken early steps, mere beginnings of wandering and exploration. As part of the last class that was taught classical photography, with many hours spent in the darkroom, I learned to appreciate the fragility of every split-second that a picture can immortalise. Initially full into analog photography as a medium, I’ve had the pleasure of meeting and becoming friends with local influential local photographers, Daniil Lavroski, Hans Borg and Tim-Theo Deceuninck.
That photographer is still a large part of me, influencing my films and other work. Each friend I made along the way has left their mark on style and thought process. I always kept control over the cinematography of my own work, acting as my own director of photography. I desire each frame to be a self-contained image. The tension between the compositional needs of moving images and those of classical photography is a challenge I can endlessly lose myself in.
I’m currently working on my very first production called At Rise Of Curtain. It is a Gesamtkunstwerk in which performance, dance, and theater are either altered or adorned by its own production. The production takes on the challenging form of a public event, the stage becomes a podium, and each visitor transforms into a participant. This narrative and occurrence develop into various structures and trajectories within the arts, from a performance to an exhibition to a publication. Here I'll include some of those influential people in the cast and crew and I’ll trust somebody else with the framing.
