'Hunter from Elsewhere: A journey with Helen Britton' + Q&A

A poetic exploration of an excitingly unknown and highly inspiring universe. As we accompany the Australian artist around the globe, Helen Britton's incredible attention to material and detail teaches us that the closer we look at things, the more they have to tell us.

Australian artist Helen Britton's pieces seem to emerge from some forgotten Wunderkammer. And yet her art is modern, avant-garde jewelry, sculptures and drawings, admired and collected around the world.

The film follows her stalking through the German outback, seeking out abandoned workshops, forgotten artisans and manufacturing processes vanishing in time. Visiting the heavy industry sites of her Australian childhood in Newcastle NSW, stone carvers in Idar-Oberstein and glassblowers in Thuringia, we reach her Munich studio, where the artist amalgamates her capture, memories, and precious materials into timeless miniature sculptures.

Beyond a simple portrait, the film is a poetic, essayistic approach to a rarely documented creative genre and a subjective narration of a relationship between the protagonist, her work and the filmmaker. Filmed over a four-year period, it is a reflection on art, memories and storytelling, with insightful interviews with the artists friends and colleagues.

Hunter from Elsewhere is an astonishing film because it tells stories about telling stories and in its slightly melancholic mood deals irretrievably with the past and yet is completely in the here and now

Julie Metzdorf, Bayerischer Rundfunk

Helen Britton and Elena Alvarez Lutz are alchemists who transform our view of the seemingly worthless.

Dunja Bialas, Artechock

Filmmaker Elena Alvarez Lutz shares jewellery artist Helen Britton’s fascinations with us in a beautiful portrait filmed in Germany and Australia. The journey brings us to unexpected places like mines, industrial areas, souvenir shops, old factories, and the ocean where Helen finds beauty and inspiration in the smallest details of human activity and nature.

Liesbeth Den Besten, Art historian & curator

Never intrusive, but finely observed – an almost tactile approach to a fascinating woman and her practice. You follow Britton as she explores materials – which at times feels like archaeology, delving into industrial relics as much as her own life. From what jewellery works become a form of condensed, transformed memory.

Thomas Willmann, Münchner Merkur

Conceived, directed & produced by Elena Alvarez Lutz. 97 min, color, HD, Dolby 5.1, English & German, English subtitles

This screening coincides with Helen Britton's new exhibition 'Koala Hotel' at Funaki, Melbourne until 11 February. A Q+A with the artist will follow.

Host or Publisher Funaki