Rainer Komers

Rainer Komers (left) in the Oasis of Ma'rib 2007

Rainer Komers (born February 1, 1944 in Guben in Niederlausitz ) is a German filmmaker and cameraman . In addition to his multiple award-winning documentaries , he has also worked as an author , photographer , graphic artist and translator .

life and work

Rainer Komers worked for the student film club in Bonn from 1964 to 1965, for which he a. a. designed and printed the posters. He then worked as head of serigraphy at the Op Art gallery Denise René Hans Mayer in Krefeld . From 1973 to 1975 he held a teaching position for screen printing at the Düsseldorf Art Academy . There he also completed a degree in film and graduated in 1981 as a master class student . In 2003–2004 he also completed a guest study in photography at the Folkwang University in Essen .

Rainer Komers has been making documentaries as a director since 1972 and also works as a cameraman. His films have been shown at film festivals in 35 countries as well as on television in Germany and the USA.

In addition, Komers writes poems, essays and articles, which u. a. have been published by DVA , Random House , Reclam and in der Zeit and the Süddeutsche Zeitung . In 2018, his volume of poetry came out, Words Fly Agfa. Travel reports about India , Japan and Yemen were presented on Deutschlandfunk . His visual and audio-visual works have been exhibited in museums and galleries, for example in the " Szene Rhein Ruhr '72" , the Kunsthalle Düsseldorf and in the large art exhibition NRW in the Kunstpalast Düsseldorf .

As a filmmaker, he received a Goethe scholarship at the Goethe-Institut Villa Kamogawa in Kyoto in 2015 . As an author, he was a finalist at the Munich Poetry Prize in 2016 .

Komers lives alternately in Mülheim an der Ruhr and in Berlin .

Cine poems

In a double movement, Komers began to write poems, while at the same time dispensing with voice-overs and dialogues in his films. The carefully composed original tones and noises (ambient sound) tell their specific audiovisual story in harmony with Komer's photographic settings. The result is poetic descriptions of landscapes and places in the spirit of the avant-garde of the 1920s.

With the short film "Seseke classic" (2010) Komers began to experiment with the use of poetry in film. This development led to “Barstow, California” (2018) and its protagonist, the poet and prisoner Stanley “Spoon” Jackson (* 1958). The long documentary, which is set in Jackson's hometown of Barstow in the Mojave Desert , is supported by the autobiography By Heart, which he has read in excerpts, and his poems. In live events, Jackson is connected by phone after the film is shown and can read his poems himself and talk about them with the audience. Beginning with his activities in 2008, and with the Barstow film, Komers supported the release of the African American, who has been serving a life sentence without parole for murder since 1977.

Filmography (selection)

Rainer Komers near the city of Manācha 2007

Directorial work

1965: Tom Doyle and Eva Hesse (together with Werner Nekes)
1967: sidings
1972: Knowing how things go
1976: 2211 Büttel
1980: Gypsies in Duisburg
1981: 480 tons up to a quarter to ten - At the port workers in Duisburg-Hochfeld
1983: who paid for Hitler? - Resistance and persecution in Mülheim an der Ruhr 1933–1945
1985: The stars of home
1989: Memory of Rheinhausen (together with Klaus Helle )
1992: Latvian summer
1995: Oven out (together with Klaus Helle )
1999: B 224
2004: Nome Road System
2004: NH 2
2006: Kobe
2008: Ma'rib
2009: Milltown, Montana
2010: Seseke classic
2012: 25572 Büttel
2014: Daugava Delta
2014: Ruhr Record
2017: Course reports
2018: Barstow, California

camera

1967: The Big Pump (Director: Peter Könitz )
1979: Gate 2 (Director: Klaus Wildenhahn )
1981: Bandonion 1 + 2 (Director: Klaus Wildenhahn)
1982: Nekes (Director: Werner Nekes )
1986: From studio to colliery (Director: Georg Bender )
1987: Fasia - of defiant women and a troubadora (Director: Rea Karen )
1988: Die Bank (Director: Reinald Schnell )
1988: Die Judengasse (Director: Peter Nestler)
1990: Zeil, Frankfurt (Direction: Dieter Reifarth, Bert Schmidt)
1995: Pachamama - Our Earth (Director: Peter Nestler)
1995: City of Clay and Light - The Rescue of the Old City of Sana'a (Director: Shabbir Siddiquie)
2000: A small film for Bonn (together with Gisela Tuchtenhagen; director: Klaus Wildenhahn)
2000: Escape (Director: Peter Nestler)
2000: Eye-Step (2nd camera; director: Dore O)
2002: The Metamorphosis of the Good Neighbor (Director: Peter Nestler)
2003: Die Rollbahn (Direction: Malte Rauch / Bernhard Türcke / Eva Voosen)
2003: The helpers and the women (Director: Karin Jurschick )
2004: Homage to a robber (Director: Enzio Edschmid )
2007: Cat good - 9 weeks of crane conversion at the HDW shipyard in Kiel (Director: Fredo Wulf )
2007: Five Sex Rooms and a Kitchen (Director: Eva Heldmann )
2012: Then I'm a murderer (Director: Walter Manoschek )
2013: Villa Tugendhat (Director: Dieter Reifarth )
2015: Franzosensand (Director: Bettina Nürnberg / Dirk Peuker)
2017: The Berkel (Director: Anna Schlottbohm / Willem Kootstra)
2020: Picasso in Vallauris (Director: Peter Nestler)

Prices (selection)

1979 and 2006:: Ruhr Prize for Art and Science
1980: Prize of the German film critic for "Gypsies" in Duisburg
1987: Krakow Film Festival, Silver Dragon for "The Stars of Home"
2001: Hessian Film Prize for B 224
2005: German short film award in gold for "Nome Road System"
2007: Views from the Ruhr area, melting pot award for "Kobe"
2010: Filmfest Augenweide Kiel, Documentary Award; Film Festival of the Ruhr Area, Blick Prize; Big Sky Film Festival (Missoula / USA), Excellence of Editing Award (Editor: Bert Schmidt); Festival Territoires en Images (Paris), grand prix for Milltown, Montana
2016: Big Sky Film Festival (Missoula / USA), Best Short Award for "Daugava Delta"
2018: Duisburg Film Week , ARTE Documentary Award for "Barstow, California"

Publications

Words fly agfa. (Poems 1998-2018), Open Field Edition, Dortmund 2018, ISBN 978-3752866094 .
as co-editor and translator: Spoon Jackson: Rock Doves wake up on cell block 8. Poems and Prose, Dortmund 2017, ISBN 978-3744820028 .