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Natz Spetsman, the self-titled “Egotainment Filmaker,” is anything but. His visionary portrait, “Natz in Berlin,” is a series of emotionally evocative vignettes of the heart and soul of Berlin. It’s both intoxicating and intimate. As the stories unfold, Spetsman draws us into his world. We see an exotic dancer in pinks and reds in an erotic performance with balloons, a high-speed graffiti bandit, his muse and beauties of all genders living out their dreams and fantasies in this luscious and gritty portrayal of his beautiful urban jungle and its inhabitants. Spetsman invokes Hitchcock’s Rear Window as his camera pans back and forth between the subject and the artist, as both become voyeur and participant. |
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Vision Jockey and Egotainment – Marcia Mercadante
Natz Spetsman, the self-titled “Egotainment Filmaker,” is anything but. His visionary portrait, “Natz in Berlin,” is a series of emotionally evocative vignettes of the heart and soul of Berlin. It’s both intoxicating and intimate. As the stories unfold, Spetsman draws us into his world. We see an exotic dancer in pinks and reds in an erotic performance with balloons, a high-speed graffiti bandit, his muse and beauties of all genders living out their dreams and fantasies in this luscious and gritty portrayal of his beautiful urban jungle and its inhabitants. Spetsman invokes Hitchcock’s Rear Window as his camera pans back and forth between the subject and the artist, as both become voyeur and participant. Intercut with pulsing beats and songs, Spetsman embraces the reinvention of Berlin, its new and groundbreaking art and ideology, with vibrancy and inspiration. The portrait is currently on exhibition at Rio in Berlin, part of the web of international galleries in conjunction with Artnews Projects.
I met Natz at a screening of one of his films. Ever the tireless hunter, fascinated by people, their faces, their stories, their aspirations, ideas and energy, he is always on the lookout for the next collaboration. Behind the shades, Spetsman is open, exposing himself while sensitively probing his next work of art. He breaks the Spetsman studied film at St. Martin’s School of Art under the tutelage of the late filmmaker Derek Jarman. He cites Caravaggio and Blue as his favorite Jarman films. Spetsman was moved by Jarman’s tremendous vision and passion to create, particularly in his last film, in which the filmmaker used his own mortality as subject and hypothesis. One of the first artists to die of HIV, Jarman moved into a cottage near the Sellefield nuclear power plant in England where he made this film, which reveals his life and vision. Born from his great respect of Jarman, “Egotainment” becomes the catch-phrase of a new genre for Spetsman; explored and presented as a continual, cyclical, conceptual work expanding and juxtaposing the mediums of video and music and artist and subject. In Spetsman’s words, “‘Egotainment’ is, to see who you are.”
His first exposure to film was at the age of six, when his parents gave him a 8mm crank projector for Mickey Mouse films. After watching the films, he took apart the camera, fascinated by its workings. He sees the camera as a reversed projector, a mirror of reflection, which unites subjective and objective reality. In this original conceptual aesthetic, Spetsman always uses two cameras, sometimes as microphones. He has shot over 50 films, which he refers to as “talkies” and “music movies.” While still in film school, his short, Jump Cut, was selected by The British Film Institute where it was shown at several international film festivals in Australia, Europe and America. At Bavaria Film Studios, Munich, he started as assistant director. In three years, he was promoted to Executive Producer/Director and, at this time also, he established his own company, Centrumfilms, where he produced and directed music videos, commercials and his experimental films. Moving back to Berlin, Spetsman then had a stint as Creative Producer for Babelsberg Studios. The following year, Centrumfilms produced “Live in Berlin” for MTV. For KirchMedia, Spetsman wrote, performed, directed and produced “Serial Monogamy,” a 365-part series for Sun TV and TANGO.TV/Luxembourg.
I had the opportunity of viewing one of Spetsman’s best works, Natz in Recession. This 60-minute film was made in 2002. It explores the “recession,” both in its economic and emotional consequences. The film opens with Spetsman eating at his desk. He announces that, because of the recession, he is erasing one of his earlier films to use the tape for a new piece. The film is intercut with real people and their stories and is directed by Spetsman. A woman evokes Marilyn Monroe as she puts on a blond wig and tells her lover that the obstacle between her and her happiness is always the difference of 500 Deutsche marks. She is juxtaposed by a praying mantis who relates the tragedy of his post-coital demise. The couple continuously argue over his stolen car and her 500 marks. Freezing cold, Spetsman appears and comments that “Germans love to burn things they don’t like,” as he burns his student films and two books; The History of Religion and Dianetics, in the coal stove to stay warm. By integrating Jump Cut, his colorful, luminescent student composition which features a young Spetsman in London, we get to see through his eyes as he watches planes in flight in the London cityscape, flying backwards and away from the buildings. As a New Yorker living in post 9/11 times, I found this a healing experience—the hand of art saving the London skyline. All of this is told and filmed with satiric wit and joie de vivre.
You can view the “dailies” on the web at YouTube.com, under Nuttyfilmsberlin. There are almost a hundred interviews from his music talk show, filmed live in Berlin or at the P-Nutz Studio.
