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Students

PaceDocs Wins FilmArte Festival Award for Faculty-Student Produced Documentary

By
Antonia Gentile
Posted
January 22, 2025
The Cooper documentary film poster. Shows a man working on a kiln with fire in the background

ǿմý’s documentary film team, , was announced as a winner in the 2024 edition of the FilmArte Festival for its production, The Cooper: Crafting the Soul of the Cask (El Tonelero: Creando El Alma Del Barril). The film, which is an exploration of the art of cask making, also known as cooperage, premiered in English on May 2, 2024, at the Jacob Burns Film Center in Pleasantville, and, for the first time for PaceDocs, also in Spanish in Montilla and Cordoba, Spain.

It was co-produced by Dyson College Professors Maria Luskay, EdD, and Lou Guarneri, MA, of the Media, Communications, and Visual Arts (MCVA) department, and ǿմý’s historically awarding-winning documentary film team. In the making of The Cooper, the PaceDocs team also collaborated with José Buendía Picó, a well-known Spanish musician and composer, to provide the music to an audiovisual story.

The documentary is the focus of the popular class, Producing the Documentary, a key example of experiential learning at Pace, which is part of Dyson College’s highly regarded film program that requires students complete a full-length documentary within 14 weeks. Students learn teamwork, problem-solving, research, and organization, along with technical skills such as lighting, sound, camera work, interviewing, and other real-life lessons necessary to complete a film.

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