PEDRO COSTA
Casa de Lava
Oct. 08 2019
MassArt Design and Media Center
PEDRO COSTA | After he studied History at the University of Lisbon, Costa (b. Lisbon, Portugal 1958) then worked as an assistant to Portugese artists Jorge Silva Melo, Vítor Gonçalves A Girl In Summer (1984) and João Botelho. His debut at the age of 30 was with Blood (1989), revealing Costa’s soon to be signature unconventional construction and execution of narrative.
Once Blood was completed, the director made way to Cape Verde with intentions to recreate Jacques Tourneur’s I Walked with a Zombie (1943).
CASA DE LAVA | As a reflection on his country’s colonial legacy Costa’s Casa de Lava (1994) abandons its original narrative for the improvisation provided by the acting in the islands people and the circumstances of the location. At the end of filming, the islanders entrusted him with gifts and messages for their families back in Lisbon. This led the director to Fontainhas, a neighborhood with a history steeped in the same colonial legacy that he set out to understand.