Mara Alper

Mara Alper is an award-winning media artist and documentary maker. Mara's affinities with dance, animation, film and video as expressive media have shaped her life. Her themes focus on social issues, older traditions and questions about people's similarities, differences and motivations.

In Mexico, she has interviewed shaman and tribal leaders in the native Huichol tribe, descendants of the Aztecs. They discussed forgiveness and attitudes toward aging and death. Images include traditional music, scenes from daily lives and sacred arts. In Bali, she studied the art of shadow puppets and dance, intrinsic elements in the Balinese Hindu religion. On the Greek island of Crete, she wrote and painted for several months in a mountain cave facing the Mediterranean Sea, influenced by their ancient Minoan culture. These experiences have helped her learn to recognize and respect the many values humans share, and to focus on our similarities rather than our differences.

http://www.maraalper.com/index.html

I have been really inspired by Alper's work. Her documentaries have opened so many eyes to different cultures and how people live their lives. I want to eventually create a documentary so that I can also open people's eyes.

I feel that talking to people is so important and that every opinion can create a difference to somebody else's life. I feel that by catching emotions of people can affect and change someones thoughts and therefore I set out to speak to people and to understand why they do something. I no longer feel that I should speak to somebody before judging them or their ways.