Spain’s Latido Films has clinched world sales rights to doc “Freedom To Dreams” on Spain’s leading modern sculptor, Eduardo Chillida. Made by Arrantxa Aguirre, one of Spain’s foremost documentary filmmakers, it world premieres at San Sebastian on Sunday.
Filmed across the seasons at Chillida-Leku, Chillida’s farmstead home and now museum, it follows Basque Goya winning actress Jone Laspuir (“Ann Is Missing,”) as she reflects and speaks to many who knew and were inspired by the artist.
Prior to Chillida’s sculptural genius he was an elite sportsman, a goalkeeper for Real Sociedad. It is a role that depends on position and a sense of space. It is also the position most spent waiting and watching. Chillida dedicated a lifetime engaging with all it means to fill and commune with space and sit with the time it took to create his works. Aguirre, is aware of the time audiences devote to her films “They lend me the most valuable thing they have, their time, and I have to fill that time with emotion and meaning so that they will lend it to me again in the next film. I hope they decide to go into the theater to see ‘Freedom to Dreams.’ Once there, I take care of my part of the pact.” she told Variety.
The sculptures are a gift for the filmmaker to frame often statically with just the sound of the nature where it sits. Where language cannot go, arts such as sculpture and music can as for some can sport. It taps the soul reminding you it’s there and that others have one, something our day to day can so often neglect to reveal.
Variety interviewed the director prior to the film’s bow:
You explore Chillida’s legacy through those who knew him, with actress Jone Laspiur as a guide. What inspired you to take this approach, and how did it shape the film?
Eduardo Chillida is an artist from the past, but not from a very distant past. There are still many people who knew him, that is, we still have access to primary sources and I wanted to take advantage of that. Jone’s presence is for two reasons. On the one hand, I wanted to encourage conversation, which I think is a very rich thing. Instead of interviews with the camera, conversations between human beings who have a certain feeling or chemistry between them. On the other hand, the figure of Jone stitches together all these testimonies and gives them continuity and meaning. All this, the walks that the characters take while they converse in the garden, makes the film take the form not of a road movie but of a path movie, more in keeping with the calm rhythm of this absent protagonist that everyone talks about.
Chillida’s sculptures are visually stunning, especially in their natural setting at Chillida Leku. You chose to shoot them across different seasons and often framed the shots statically. What guided these stylistic choices in capturing his work?
Movement is at the heart of filmmaking and I’m always on the lookout for it. But I’m usually more excited to find it within the shot than to create it by moving the camera. In this case, the fact that the sculptures are outdoors in a garden means that they also function as screens reflecting the movement of the leaves of the trees, the insects or the raindrops that slide across their surface. If you pay attention, a real ballet unfolds before your eyes, where nature and art interact with each other.
Chillida was deeply disciplined in his process, following his own strict rules, as revealed in the film. Do you follow similar rules or restrictions in your filmmaking to guide your creative vision?
I don’t think so. When you make documentaries you have to be very open minded because you’re working in real scenarios and with real people who haven’t learned a text. You’re never sure what’s going to happen, what they’re going to say or how they’re going to react. You have to be alert, ready to change your plan quickly. You never know how or when the relevant moment is going to come.
Chillida’s early career as a goalkeeper for Real Sociedad is a rare intersection of sport and art. Do you think his athletic skills, especially understanding time and space, might have influenced his sculptural work?
No doubt about it. First, because everything you do in depth ends up serving you for the future. Secondly, because sculpture in particular is a very physical art, requiring strength, dexterity, endurance and coordination between the hands and the mind. Chillida’s experience as a goalkeeper gave him a great advantage in that sense. He had also pointed out how a goalkeeper has the duty of guarding the three-dimensional space of the goal and how that is closely related to his work as a sculptor.
In today’s fast-paced world, most of us struggle with time, while Chillida embraced slowness to uncover the essential. What did you learn during the making of this film about time, and is there something we can all take away from Chillida’s approach?
I believe that Chillida’s is a revolutionary way of relating to time. Today we are beginning to hear voices praising slowness. In that sense, Chillida was ahead of his time and we can learn from him. Personally I identify with the serene rhythm that emanates from his writings and his works and I hope that the viewer of the film also succumbs to the charm of slowness, not only to be able to enjoy this film, but to be able to enjoy life in another, in my opinion, more fulfilling way.
In a world that’s becoming more homogenized, Chillida’s art feels inseparable from the Basque region. How important is it to celebrate local culture in this way, especially in today’s globalized landscape?
In Greek mythology there was a giant, Antaeus, who lost his strength every time he was pushed off the ground. I think we have to be very conscious of where we come from or else we are going to weaken hopelessly. Chillida used the image of the tree “with its roots in the earth and its arms open to the world” to talk about a cosmopolitan that does not deny its origins but knows how to value them, an intelligent cosmopolitan.
