Ep. 48 Psychogeography with Rajee Samarasinghe
In this episode, filmmaker Rajee Samarasinghe talks about how he shares his memories on screen, playing with audience expectations in his work, and finding purpose in using footage he shot years ago. Finally, in today's concluding thought, Edwards talks about social anxiety.
Guest Bio:
Rajee Samarasinghe {he/him) was born and raised amidst the decades-long civil war in Sri Lanka. He later left for the United States where he is now based. He received his BFA from the University of California San Diego and his MFA from the California Institute of the Arts. Much of his work examines sociopolitical conditions in Sri Lanka through the scope of deconstructing ethnographic practices and the colonial gaze in contemporary media. His practice was born out of a desire to understand the circumstances around his childhood and often navigates the terrain of memory, migration, and impermanence.
Samarasinghe is currently working on his debut feature film, Your Touch Makes Others Invisible, which explores post-civil war Sri Lanka—the project has received support from the Sundance Institute's Documentary Film Program, Berlinale Talents' Doc Station, Field of Vision, and True/False Film Festival’s PRISM program. Samarasinghe was also named one of Filmmaker Magazine’s 25 New Faces of Independent Film in 2020. He had solo shows at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), the Berwick Film & Media Arts Festival, the San Diego Underground Film Festival in 2021, and the Los Angeles Filmforum in 2022. His works have been exhibited at many festivals and venues such as the Tiger Short Competition at the International Film Festival Rotterdam, New Directors/New Films presented by Film Society of Lincoln Center & MoMA, MoMA’s Doc Fortnight, BFI London Film Festival, Slamdance, SFFILM Festival, Melbourne International Film Festival, Vancouver International Film Festival, and BlackStar Film Festival, among others. He’s received the Tíos Award for Best International Film at the Ann Arbor Film Festival, the Film House Award for Visionary Filmmaking at the Athens International Film + Video Festival, and an Honorable Mention Award at the Thomas Edison Film Festival among others. He is also a member of Asian American Documentary Network (A-Doc).
Time Codes:
1:05 - Rajee's film upbringings
8:05 - Discussing the overall aesthetics and themes in Rajee's shorts
18:15 - Presenting Family Portraits in If I Were Any Further Away I'd Be Closer to Home
26:20 - Working with sound, color, and memories in The Exile
33:28 - Discovering spirits and spectral ethnography in The Eyes of Summer
46:23 - Making art ambiguous, working with audience's expectations, how festivals play his films, and how all of his films are one film
54:30 - Exploring the many dimensions of the moving image and his positionally in Show Me Other Places
1:02:33 - Rajee's updates and working with dialogue in his debut feature Your Touch Makes Others Invisible
1:10:45 - Rajee's recommendations: In a Year with 13 Moons and Siddheshwari
1:12:16 - Concluding Thought: Edward dealing with his social anxiety
Show Notes:
Your Touch Makes Others Invisible project page
Trailers for The Exile, The Eyes of Summer, and Show Me Other Places
This episode is available on Spotify, Apple Music, Google Podcasts, RadioPublic, and Stitcher.