2 minute read
A Science and Cinema Masterclass
AUP students regularly encounter diverse viewpoints via exposure to interdisciplinary industry professionals. On March 14, 2023, French–Venezuelan filmmaker Alexis Gambis was invited to give a masterclass to students, consisting of a lecture, a technical workshop and an exclusive screening of his 2020 film Son of Monarchs. Gambis is part of the “Science New Wave,” a movement characterized by a rejection of traditional scientific film conventions in favor of experimentation and personal expression.
Gambis’s films explore scientific themes alongside those of migration, identity and belonging. He invited students to engage with these themes by heading out into Paris to shoot the natural world at the micro scale using a specialized camera attachment. “It had never occurred to me how similar film and science were until Alexis’s class,” said first-year Sterling Knight. “My mind was flipped upside down in the best way.”
“Alexis embodies the spirit of interdisciplinarity,” said Isabelle Carbonell, who organized the masterclass alongside fellow film professor Emre Caglayan. “He uses the modalities of a scientist and filmmaker equally to imagine new ways of understanding the world.”
