Nomads of the Future
"Nomads of the Future" is a proposal for the realization of a documentary. Recorded in DV and lasting approximately 40 minutes, the documentary will approach the lifestyle of the nomadic artisans: people who decided to leave everything they owned in order to travel freely, discover new places, and above all to learn about other cultures. In return, they offer their art, that which they know how to do best, such as crafts, music, juggling, even story-telling. In short, any form of artistic expression. The route of the documentary will start and finish in Andalusia , land of the journeyer and a motley array of cultures—a utopia for many travelers.
Typically, most people who live in sedentary societies do not harbor positive thoughts about the nomadic artisans. Some view these travelers as uneducated, eccentric, and some even maintain that they hold no values. This documentary will attempt to dispel these types of misguided impressions about the nomadic lifestyle. Many of these nomads come from a rich sedentary past, but, for one reason or another, simply decided that it was better for them to live day by day and in constant movement.
In addition, this kind of living is characterized by a strong cohesion of the group, where, like a large family, they all take care of each other simultaneously. Nevertheless, this form of living also has its own characteristic problems which can be derived from the legal arrangement of the activities that are developed, from the vicissitudes of the trip itself, between different cities and countries, to problems arising from the cohesion of the group.
• In a simple and straight forward language, to aim at all type of public, we want to bring about reconsideration the life of the nomad in modern times.
• To introduce the spectator to a new form of understanding life. The life of the nomadic artisan. Presenting the advantages as much as the disadvantages of a very different vital attitude to what the majority of the people are accustomed to.
• To portray forms of alternative art that, although they might be outside of the official understandings, maintain all their value as works of art, at the same time serving as a means of subsistence and travel for the nomadic artisan.
This is an emotional and intimate documentary. For that reason, the producers themselves will become the object of their production. They will not only document and analyze the life of other nomadic artisans, but while the documentary is being elaborated, the producers will adopt the form of life of those who they try to reflect in the project. It's more a performance than journalism.
It is told subjectively rather than objectively. It is more a diary than an essay, more an autobiography than a report. Its goal is to enter the world of the nomadic artisans rather than observe and report on it. The documentary will try to find answers to the questions: “Who is the nomadic artisan? What does he or she want? Why is it important to show that form of living?” We want to reveal the feeling, the attitude, and the position of the life of this community.
Within this community three different types of nomads will be the main characters of the documentary. One is the nomad who has been living several years under this form of life and can no longer conceive the idea of settling in a concrete place. Another is the nomad who lived similarly but for diverse reasons decided to settle during some months of the year and continue traveling during the others. A third character is one whose initial intention was to absent himself from ‘home' for a limited time, but during the trip the ‘having to go back' call disappears and he transforms himself into a nomad.
Ideally, the story will be told by its protagonists, always in their own words and voices.
Cinema Verité. Escaping the narrator in the traditional sense and relying on portable cameras and sound equipment to put the viewer close to the action without outside distractions.
The story starts in Andalusia (south of Spain ), where many nomads from all over the world converge. Perhaps because Andalusia has been a land for many diverse civilizations, maybe because it's a departure and arrival point of many great historical travels, or simply because it is a land of immigrants coming and going, it has become a utopia for many travelers. It is a place for departure, arrival, and even more so, it is the place to stay. For this reason we will start our own travels there, with the settled semi-nomad.
From Andalusia, we will travel to Latin America , which is the land that all nomadic artisans dream with when it comes to traveling. We will travel from Tijuana to Tierra del Fuego, then going back to Andalusia , finishing with the same character with which we started the story.
During the filming, we will follow some specific characters as well as interview the nomads that we find along the way. The trip will function according to the necessities of each of the characters. Some times we will have to stop in the same place for a couple of weeks and some other times keep going for a couple of days.
The first aim of our team is to have the least cultural and environmental impact as possible in the places we travel through. Similarly to the people we wish to document, we understand that a nomadic life must be based on mutual respect with the environment. The necessity of adaptation to a new place requires an integrated of natural spaces where the continuous trip is developed.
On the other hand, living as a perpetual traveller also requires taking maximum advantage of the natural resources of subsistence with respect to the inherent environmental balance. For this reason, as much as possible, we want to come near to the ascentral interchange between nature and humanity.
We consider that the best way for our project to contribute to a sustainable environment is to travel as ecologically consciously as possible. Therefore we have decided to convert our vehicle, in which we will reside and travel for over a year, in to an eco-friendly, renewable energy vehicle. We are converting the vehicle to run on vegetable oil, or bio-diesel as default. We are bringing along equipment and materials to generate our own fuel from waste materials along the way, completing the cycle of reuse. In addition, we would like to have all the electrical power run by solar panels mounted atop the van itself.
In our daily routine we will follow the basic tenants of environmental awareness: the collection of refuse or recycling, always trying to ensure that the interaction with our surroundings is fruitful and respectful.
Following the spirit of the characters that make up this story, the trip that the makers of “Nomads of the Future” will embark, will try to approach as much as possible this kind of lifestyle based in auto-sustenance, the usage of resources, the implication with the surroundings and the integration with people and cultures.
Because of this, the trip will try to capitalize as much as possible all the economic means available, traveling with the technical material integrated in the transport and using all the ecological resources in reach (bio-diesel, solar energy). Under this concept the whole team will travel in one vehicle which at the same time will be the recording and editing studio.The makers will leave from an Andalusia open to the world and will integrate nomadism in their lifestyle.
