The Big Tree Collective
In the Autumn of 2014, seeds were planted as we all met at the Granada Centre for Visual Anthropology, at the University of Manchester. Seeds that are now growing to become a Big Tree. On this site you will find our different projects from around the world.
Everything matters. Big Tree productions is a group of academics, activists and visual artists combining their expertise to empower people in raising their voices and be represented through the creation and distribution of audiovisual projects. It encourages the conviction that the world can be seen as a matrix of interconnected occurrences of equal significance, and should be treated as such.
Members and Bios
Paloma Yáñez Serrano Paloma is an independent ethnographic filmmaker and social anthropologist interested in the methods of adaptation humans develop to address changing environment, technology and political conflicts. She has been working for seven years making films and research projects in Congo, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Spain, Brazil and Mexico. In parallel, she has worked as a facilitator of text and mix-media interactive workshops with children and adults. She is currently doing a PhD in visual anthropology at the University of Manchester studying people’s adaptation to industrial agriculture and changing landscape in the south of Spain. (bigtreecollective.com) 
Daniel Lema Born in 1985, Daniel completed a five-years Law & Economics Degree before going on to study a BA Photography in Edinburgh. There, his work naturally showed a strong interest in anthropological topics and was exhibited at the University of Edinburgh, among other collective exhibitions. He then decided to pursue an MA in Visual Anthropology at The University of Manchester where he graduated with Distinction. From there on, he has been developing his vision as ethnographic filmmaker and deepening his interest in ethics, aesthetics and story telling. His film works have been already exhibited at various European ethnographic film festivals. He is currently living in Spain, where he is combining his job as freelance video maker, with his passion for education as cinema workshop's teacher. |
Clara Kleininger Clara was born 1991 in Bucharest and went on to study Social and Cultural Anthropology in Vienna, where she attained her Bachelor degree by researching magic and divination in Southern Romania. As an exchange student she studied anthropology, video and film in Mexico City. While at the Granada Centre for Visual Anthropology, she conducted part of her research with the Jamaican community of Moss Side, Manchester and graduated with ‘The Good Day’ a short film on marital agency in Moldova that won several prizes, as well as Best Film at the Ekaterinburg Student Festival of Anthropological Film. She now lives and workes in Poland, working on her next film on rehabilitation from addiction and studying as part of the Wajda Film School's documentary film programm. 
Benjamin Llorens Rocamora Benjamin has a history degree from the University of Alicante for which he conducted a research about the historical complexity of the walls of Alicante's Castle. He has production experience in la SER, one of Spain's biggest radio channels. He currently lives in the UK where he has become a graduated chef of Italian cuisine, and a sound recordist for the Big Tree Collective, being involved in film productions in Congo, Brazil, Mexico, Spain and UK. Benjamin is also interested in education and is a teacher for young children with learning difficulties. |
Lana Askari Lana studied at University College Utrecht, where she graduated with a BA in International Relations and Social Geography. Lana holds an MPhil in Social Antropologhy from the University of Cambridge for which she did research on museums amd memoralisation in Iraqi Kurdistan. After participating on a short filmaking course in Manchester, she decided to continue her visual skills and graduated from the MA in Visual Antrpologhy at the University of Manchester last year. Her graduation film "Haraka Baraka", on her parent´s return to Kurdistan has been screened at multiple festivals in Europe and was nominated for the Wiley Film Prize at the Royal Antropologhy Film Festival 2015. Lana is continuing her studies in Manchester, as a PhD candidate in Social Antropologhy with Visual Media. She is currently conducting her fieldworks in Sulaimani, Iraqi Kurdistan, where she will be filming a project on Kurdish returnees and migration. 
Spyros Gerousis Spyros Gerousis is a diverse personality characterised by different skills and qualifications. In 2012 he received his BA in Social Theology from the University of Athens and moved on to doing a MA in Visual Anthropology at the University of Manchester where he is due to start a PHD in 2016. Prior to and during his studies he worked in different positions in the TV/cinema industry from production runner and stage set technician to director of his own projects. He has been an active street artist for over 15 years, holding seminars for youngsters and participating in festivals internationally. 
Eugenio Giorgianni Eugenio Giorgianni was born in 1986 in Palermo, Italy, where he studied Anthropology, graduating with a dissertation studying the multi-layered urban scape of deprived inner-city districts. He then moved to Spain to conduct ethnographic investigations of various temporary communities of migrants. It was there, between the Baye Fall living in Granada’s Sacromonte caves and the Congolese musicians stuck in a detention centre for migrants in Melilla, that Eugenio discovered his passion for the camera, which led him to move to Manchester, where he joined the collective while studying at the Granada Centre for Visual Anthropology. Together with Paloma and Benjamin, he went to Goma in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, to shoot Amani Kila Siku, a documentary about socially conscious music in a war scenario. Eugenio is currently enrolled in a Music Ph.D programme at Royal Holloway, University of London. His doctoral research examines the international circulation of Congolese music through a participatory video ethnography, focusing on the realization of collaborative video clips. Freelance, he writes for several journals including Al Jazeera, Nigrizia, The Conversation, Dialoghi Mediterranei, in Italian and English. 
Stefania Villa Stefania was born in 1990. She studied Sociology at Bicocca University of Milan conducing various research projects in the urban area with a particular interest on the gender specificities of the immigrant population in the north of Italy. After graduating with a multi-sited ethnography on female migratory networks between Italy and Ukraine, she joined the Granada Centre of Visual Anthropology. Since then she has produced and co-directed collaborative and ethnographic documentaries in the UK, Ukraine, Brazil and Colombia (project currently in post-production). Back to Italy she started collaborating with local production companies on the realisation of narrative and artistic projects moved by the aim to investigate the different forms of exploring and sharing the multitude of compelling human stories which together create the rich, diverse and vibrant world we live in.
Ann-Kathrine Kvaernoe Born in 1988, Ann-Kathrine went to study anthropology and journalism at Aarhus University, where she graduated her BA by researching resistance narratives in cartoons and other forms of visual culture in Tbilisi, Georgia in 2012. Parallel to her degree in anthropology she started producing a range of short documentary film and podcasts in Denmark, Nepal and Mexico, which lead to her moving to Manchester in 2013 to study visual anthropology and documentary filmmaking. She is currently working in cooperation with Creative Hands Foundation on a lottery funded film project researching and documenting the process of moving a West African textile design and production unit from Hyde in United Kingdom to Accra in Ghana. |
