KATE BLACKMORE

All photos by Flore Vallery-Radot.

KATE BLACKMORE

FILMMAKER

Sydney, NSW

I have met Kate Blackmore at AFTRS (The Australian national film school). She was my teacher and exegesis (practice-based thesis) mentor. She already had many films under her belt, all in the fields that I'm passionate about. Films about artists and art, as well as films interrogating the place of women and girls in society. Read More

A few photos from Kate’s recent film set…
(More to come when the film is released.)

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I will be forever thankful for the help she provided me while writing my exegesis on documentary ethics. It was a monumental task for me. I felt confident in my ideas and structure but very fragile on the required English academic language. She ended up vastly improving all three. She patiently corrected my outrageous frenchisms and helped my “kill my babies” as is said of chopping off unnecessary paragraphs. I still mourn my idea of the benefits of being unethical… those Nazis interviewed by Claude Lanzmann. As always she was right and I was very proud of the end result.

She then invited me on set of her first feature documentary Make It Look Real to take behind the scenes photos and assist her on set. The film’s subject interconnects with my research and I was very lucky to be able to observe and document its making. It follows Intimacy Coordinator Claire Warden in her daily job of making sex scenes and on-screen intimate moments look real while making sure the process thoroughly respects actors and crew.

In good documentary style, I interviewed Kate to get to know her even better.

Connect with Kate

@_kewb_ | kateblackmore.net

INTERVIEW

I don't think my first name has much significance, my parents just liked it. My brothers were all named after relatives so I like the fact that I have my own name. Blackmore comes from Blackmore in Essex, Wiltshire, and Worcestershire and Blackmoor in Dorset. It originates from the Olde English “bloec” which means “black, dark,” and “mor,” which means hill or slope.
I was born in Adelaide, Kaurna country and I now live in Sydney, Gadigal land.
We speak English at home but I'm trying to learn Italian so I can teach my baby some words - his grandparents are Italian so they're better teachers than me!
For a long time I described myself as an artist working in film but I've recently fully committed to the term filmmaker.
There are too many to mention but a couple would be Tracey Moffat's Nightcries, Sophie Calle's Voir la mer, Shirin Neshat's Turbulent, Vernon Ah Kee's Tall Man and Angelica Mesiti's Citizen's Band (all video works!)
I've been obsessed with art ever since I can remember. I had a fairly beige suburban upbringing so loved the sense of escapism that I could access through art.
I don't come from a creative family and I didn't know any artists growing up so I didn't see it as a viable career choice. So I enrolled in an art history degree at UNSW Art & Design but very shortly after I arrived on campus I made friends who were studying Fine Arts so I switched over to that.
While I was at uni I formed a performance collective with 3 of my friends and we ended up working and travelling the world together for 15 years. It was a wildly exciting time and we were lucky to have a lot of success very early on.
I could never have imagined a path like that when I was at school!
I ate 15 bananas in one go in front of a live audience. Extravagant or grotesque?
I live for these moments but since having a baby I haven't been able to make time for them much anymore. I can lose myself by seeing amazing art, films, or reading a book from cover to cover in one day but I'm really keen to learn transcendental meditation to really take me there!
Meeting my collaborators at art school and forming a collective was a life changing moment for me as it set me off on a life changing art career.
After 10+ years of working in that group, I was given a solo commission by a curator at Campbelltown Arts Centre to make a collaborative artwork with a community in Western Sydney.
The work I made was a multi-channel portrait of a group of 14 year old girls - it was the first time I hadn't performed in my own work and it was also my first exploration into the documentary form and the ethical complexities that come along with it.
I was surprised by how natural this way of working felt and I was really excited to explore it. So, I did my Masters in Visual and Media Anthropology and got deeper and deeper into the murky world of documentary filmmaking.
There are so many! Losing my dad at 14; becoming a mum and adjusting to a life with way less space and time for myself; making my first feature documentary (at the same time); balancing the desire to make art with the need to be financially viable (a constant struggle); embarking on a new career path at 35 etc etc.
Discombobulate: it sounds like a joke word.
Authenticity, generosity, compassion.
No - I actually hate accumulating objects, I feel very weighed down by things and I'm constantly decluttering!
I have a painting by my grandmother of the remains of a farm house that she used to live in before it burnt down. I look at it and imagine what her life was like in that house, raising four kids mostly on her own. I wonder what she was thinking about when she painted it. It's my connection to her.
Haleem: the king of curry!
On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong.
Alone - greatest show on TV!
Salaam Cinema by Mohsen Makhmalbaf.
Ethiopiques Vol 21 by Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru (featured in the incredible documentary Time by Garrett Bradley).
Kiarostami
Marion Abraham's paintings are so lush and a little perverse; I also love the playfulness and absurdity of Meriem Bennani's work while being so critical of the current moment - I don't think either of these artists are emerging!
Naples, in the shadow of Mr Vesuvius, just to put everything into perspective!
I'm in the process of setting up a production company with my friend to make docos that help us come to terms with the state of our world, through a feminist lens.