Film projects shot, directed and produced by Cedric Arnold / REALFEATURES – Watch the latest Reel:

All footage, shot and directed by Cedric Arnold

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My Shaman is my Therapist

My Shaman is my Therapist is a series of films, artworks and video installations that document and research the complex mechanisms and relationships between us and our belief systems in everyday modern life.

Chapter I: Thailand

Thailand’s complex spiritual landscape incorporates elements from Buddhism to Animism, Hinduism, Daoism, Brahmanism, fortune telling and a myriad of other practices. Within this pantheon of spiritual possibilities, people create their own modular, individual experience to fit their needs.

This provides the framework for evolving practices that morph with new technologies and shifting culture, where rituals and symbols take on new meaning.

‘YANTRA’ is a documentary short on Thailand’s Yantra tattoo tradition.

For centuries, Thai people have believed in the power of talismanic tattoos. The tradition was passed down by generations of tattoo masters, who create the designs, and empower them with prayers.

Each year devotees pay respects to their tattoo masters at the “Wai Khru” (master day) ceremony. The devotees often enter a state of trance known as “Khong Khuen” (animal spirit possession) when they are “possessed” by the spirit of their tattoos.

Originally designed as a four-minute film for looping museum display (Musée du Quai Branly), the film is a much deeper and more immersive dive into the altered state the entranced devotees find themselves in.

Before this film came a photography project of the same name, which has been exhibited in 20 venues world wide including Musée du Quai Branly in Paris, Arles Photo Festival, Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, Tropen Museum, Amsterdam.

For more info on the photographic project Yantra, as well as exhibitions please visit this page:
cedricarnold.com/portfolio/yantra-the-sacred-ink/

SCREENINGS

Tropenmuseum, Amsterdam

Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts, Kaohsiung

(LC) denotes Long cut 9:49′ Formats: DCP and Mov

(MC) denotes: Looping museum cut 5:58′ Mov

Screenings / Video Installations 

Currents New Media, El Museo Cultural / Santa Fe | June 7-23 2019 (LC) 

Festival Signes de Nuit, Thai Film Archive / Bangkok | June 22-30 (LC)

SESIFF, Seoul, Official Selection Sept 2018 (LC)

Balinale, Bali, Official Selection Indonesia, Sept 2018 (LC)

Design Museum, Ghent | ‘A Wild Thing’ May 19 2017 – May 2021 (MC)

Natural History Museum, Los Angeles | Nov 19 2017 – Apr 15 2018 (MC)

Tropen Museum, Amsterdam | March 31 2017 – Dec 2018 (MC)

Alliance Française, Bangkok | Sept 14, 2017

Field Museum | Chicago Oct 17, 2016 – April 30, 2017 (MC)

Museum of Folk Art, Santa Fe | Feb 28, 2016 to March 19, 2017 (MC)

Royal Ontario Museum, Ontario | April to Sept 2016 (MC)

MAS | Museum aan de Stroom, Antwerp | Feb 16 – April 17 2016 (MC)

Tropen Museum, Amsterdam | March 20th – August 20th 2015 (MC)

Musée du Quai Branly, Paris | May 6th 2014 – Oct 18th 2015 (MC)

Galerie Olivier Waltman, Paris | May-Jun 2014 (MC)

NOT T/HERE

Not T/here is a reflection on time, self narrative and our complex relationship with reality.

The prelude to Not T/here was filmed over the past year and a half in Bangkok. It captures a strange limbo state, one of uneasy stillness, as the once most visited city on earth fell silent due to the global pandemic.

It sets the stage for the next part of the story, which explores the uniquely human act of storytelling in the context of our ever connected, yet increasingly polarised era.

BANGKOK / MUAY THAI

Originally commissioned by British Airways and cut from footage shot during the last few days of Bangkok’s legendary old Lumphinee Boxing Stadium, at the stadium itself and boxing gyms in the city, the client’s challenge was to shoot a very short film illustrating the sport of Muay Thai, working as a one man team… A large collection of stills is on my site here, many of which are available as prints: https://www.realfeatures.com/muay-thai-boxing/

APOPHENIAC

Experimental film designed as both a sigle channel and multi-channel video light and sound installation. The film, which explores memory and false memories, was created entirely by melting photographic emulsion

HALF LIGHT is a single channel video – 03:10 – For looping video installation. As part of Fragments I. Created for Bangkok Biennal 2018