Virgil Widrich

Virgil Widrich ( born May 16, 1967 in Salzburg) is an Austrian film director, screenwriter, filmmaker and multimedia artist.

Widrich working on numerous films and multimedia projects, sometimes in creative work communities. He is known mainly for its numerous short films and multimedia projects.

Life

Born in Salzburg, Virgil Widrich spent his childhood in a 500 year old house at the Salzburg mountain monk. His parents are the journalist Hans Widrich and Gerheid born Kupelwieser. In his childhood he learned to artists such as Peter Handke, who was his neighbor, and Wim Wenders, a frequent visitor to know.

At the age of 13 he received his first camera, a Super -8. In the same year (1980 ) he made three films, My Home Life, Roasted meat and 3 times Ulf. Then the cartoon color followed too can dream. At the age of 15, he turned monster in Salzburg, with whom he collaborated for the first time with actors. He realized the angry monster with stop-motion. In 1983 he began work on The Spirit of Time. Even bad grades in school were not able to dissuade him to complete his first feature-length film after more than 14 months of filming. In between, he also worked at the Salzburg Festival as an extra and prop man to finance his films. In addition, in 1984 he began to deal with computers.

After leaving school at the Academic Gymnasium in Salzburg, he attended the Vienna Film Academy, which he left it, but a few weeks to work on the screenplay for a science - fiction movie that he never realized. With two partners, he founded in 1987 the movie rental Classic Films to give especially artistic films. Later he became assistant to John Bailey, a cameraman and director, and went to Hollywood in 1990 to work with him on the sci-fi comedy The Search for intelligent life in the universe. After he had sold 1991 Classic Films, is devoted Widrich again more the computer and the ways to make creating art. His next big project on which he worked as a production manager, was a new festival for Austrian films, the (then still in Salzburg) was held in 1993 under the name diagonal for the first time. In the second year, he also created a movie database. Other databases with regard to movie followed, and he also worked on a number of interactive CD- ROMs.

1997 Widrich again began increasingly to work on own films, and created the short film tx-transform, which has been shown successfully at Ars Electronica. Widrich wrote repeatedly to the feature film screenplay for Brighter than the moon, which he filmed in 1999. The film premiered in 2000 premiere in Rotterdam. Copy Shop was his next project. The film won after the premiere in 2001 a total of 35 prizes, was nominated for an Oscar and was seen on numerous TV stations and over 200 film festivals. His next short film Fast film was also successful, won 36 international film awards and was screened at over 300 film festivals. This was followed by multimedia projects on behalf of companies (2001 establishing the checkpoint media AG, whose CEO is Widrich ) and the production of films. He founded together with other filmmakers, the film production company Amour Fou, which assumes the production of aesthetically pleasing films of predominantly young filmmakers. Widrich 2004 was a jury member of the Ars Electronica and 2004-2007 chairman of the Association of Film Directing Austria. He is also a member of the Academy of the Austrian film. From 2007 to 2010 Virgil Widrich was Univ. -Prof. for the class "digital art " in the context of occupational, post-graduate university course "Art & Economy " working at the University of Applied Arts Vienna. Since 2010 he leads ibid. as Univ. -Prof. the master course " Art & Science ".

Exhibitions

In the following, of course, both female and male persons, and " students " means:

• 2006: designing interactive media for the Mozart House Vienna
• 2008: presentation of 13 works by Virgil Widrich students under the " Essence08 " at the Museum of Applied Arts (Vienna)
• 2009: In the framework of Linz Capital of Culture 2009 artistic director of the exhibition at the City Museum Nordico "Linz city in luck. ".
• 2009 " Alias ​​in Wonderland " ( 25 June-12 July 2009) in the free space / quartier 21, Museumsquartier Vienna, realized by the students of the digital arts at the University of Applied Arts.
• 2009: 10 works by students of digital art were exhibited as part of the " Essence09 " in the Expositur Front Zollamtsstraße.
• 2010: 15 works by students of digital art could be seen in the context of " Essence10 " at Künstlerhaus Vienna.
• 2010: Artistic director of the exhibition "90 years of the Salzburg Festival" in the 'Salzburg Museum "
• 2011: Artistic director of the exhibition "parameter { world } - parameters for every or no thing" the master "Art and Science " at the University of Applied Arts ( 30 March-1 April 2011)
• 2012: works by students of the class " Art & Science " could be seen as part of the " Essence12 " at Künstlerhaus Vienna.

Music Theatre

• 2012: Conception ( with Martin Haselboeck and Frank Hoffmann), design of stage and film projections for the musical theater project " New Angels ", which was premiered on 19 November 2012 at the Théâtre National du Luxembourg.

Filmography

Since 2008, project development for the feature film "The Night of a Thousand Hours" since 2011 and project development for the feature-length animated film " Micromeo " ( screenplay with Jean -Claude Carrière ).

Prices

• Screenplay Prize of the city of Salzburg for Best Screenplay (1997)
• Jean Carment Award for Lars Rudolph - Angers European First Film Festival ( 2000)
• Laser Vidéo Titres Award - Angers European First Film Festival ( 2000)

• Oscar nomination 2002 in the category "life action short" by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
• Prix ​​de la meilleure creation sonore / Best Music and Sound Design - Festival du Court - Métrage de Clermont -Ferrand (26 January 2001-3 February 2001. )
• Best Experimental Short - Toronto - International Short Film Festival (June 6, 2001-10 June 2001. )
• Kodak Award - Jury 's choice for short film - Puchon International Fantastic Film Festival 2001 (12 July 2001-20 July 2001. )
• Jury Price - IMAGO 2001 - Covilha, Portugal (25 September 2001-30 September 2001. )
• Silver Dove - 44th International Leipzig Festival for Documentary and Animated Film (. 2001-21 October 16 October 2001)
• Best Short Film - Lleida 2001 - inCURT (7 November 2001-11 November 2001. )
• Best Experimental - Shorts International Film Festival New York 2001 (12 November 2001-15 November 2001. )
• 1st. Comunidad de Madrid Award - Best Film - Madrid - Semana de Cine Experimental (. November 16 2001-23 November 2001)
• Best Short Film - Barcelona L' alternativa 01 (16 November 2001-24 November 2001. )
• Prize of the Jury - Leuven Kort 2001 - International Short Film Festival (23 November 2001-2 December 2001. )
• Best Of Festival - Boston Underground Film Festival ( February 20 2002-24 February 2002. )
• Prix ​​des televisions europeennes - Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival (15 March 2002-30 March 2002. )
• Special Prize - Hiroshima Kokusai Animation Festival 2002 (22 August 2002-26 August 2002. )
• Best Experimental Film - Thessaloniki 02 - Panorama of Ind. Film and Video Makers (October 14, 2002 - October 21, 2002 )
• Special Jury Prize - Tehran International Animation Festival (23 February 2003-27 February 2003. )

• Official selection Cannes Film Festival ( 2003) ( nomination )
• Best Animated Short ( CORE Digital Pictures Award) - Worldwide Short Film Festival, Toronto (2003)
• Grand Prize for animation ( Grande Prémio animação ) - Festival Internacional de Curtas Metragens de Vila do Conde, Portugal (2003 )
• Best Experimental Short Film - 52nd Int. Film Festival, Melbourne ( 2003)
• Audience Award - Bearded Child Film Festival, Grand Rapids, MN / Boulder, CO USA ( 2003)
• Most Imaginative film - Odense Film Festival, Odense ( 2003)
• High Risk Award - Fantoche - 4th International Animation Film Festival, Baden ( Switzerland ) (2003 )
• Best Experimental Film - Panorama of Independent Film & Video Makers, Thessaloniki ( 2003)
• Most Innovative Short Film - International Leipzig Festival for Documentary and Animated Film (2003)
• Grand Prix - Uppsala International Short Film Festival ( 2003)
• Premio de la Comunidad de Madrid a la Mejor Película - Semana de Cine Experimental de Madrid ( 2003)
• Onda Curta, 2nd Prize and Special Jury Mention - Cinanima Portugal (2003 )
• Innovation Award - Animadrid, Spain ( 2003)
• Film Critics Award - Anima Festival Zagreb ( 2004)
• ASIFA Korea Prize for best experimental SICAFs (2004)
• Cartoon d' Or - Best Animated Movie Cartoon Forum Galicia (2004)