writer – director – producer – factotum
Ben’s pronouns are we/us, because you can not talk about any person without also talking about yourself. He though accepts the pronouns he/his, so everybody understands this text.
Ben was born in the sign of the Gemini some weeks after Sartre died. In his urge to understand a world that doesn’t make sense, Ben studied physics, sociology, religion and film. He is a postmodernist, who believes that the idea of human progress has proven a worthless tautology. We change because we change without a final cause. We only find what we seek for – and nothing beyond. There is no absolute truth without metaphysical implications (also and especially in science) and therefore this truth can not exist. The current focus of „authenticity“ in art mirrors the unfounded concept of a world „out there“, beyond our perception and thoughts, that has divided our minds and our societies into competitive parts. If art has any purpose, it’s not to show the „truth“ but to show, that truth is always a human construction.
Ben’s nostalgic desire for real moments in this simulation we still call society is the main drive for his film-making. These „real“ moments (in other words: original, referenceless sensual experiences) had been the key to success for the medium film in the past. By now, of course, films are made of simulacra refering to pre-existing simulacra, which turns extremely obvious, when you hear what producers like to say quite often: „Write me a film which is just like the film I’ve seen last night.“ But film-making can still be more than that. Maybe it’s not possible anymore to experience real moments, not even possible for a film-maker to refer to real moments, but by challenging the viewer’s expectations (and also the film-maker’s own ones) we sometimes manage to deconstruct the references and therefore achieve originality. This becomes more and more difficult, but it’s our Sysiphean task. Ben has decided to roll this boulder up the hill (it’s quite surely an unhewn monolith) and he will never bow to the agents of the ever-same.
