Punto de Vista presents the first retrospective in Spain of the work of German director Peter Nestler, a key figure in contemporary European documentary film

01/12/2023

Under the title Es nahen andere Zeiten / Se acercan otros tiempos [Other Times are Coming], given its importance it will be travelling after the festival to Barcelona, Madrid, Coruña and Valencia
The book Punto de Vista publishes every year will also deal with his career, as yet little known in Spain

Punto de Vista is to devote one of the two retrospectives in this year's edition, held from 27th March to 1st April 2023, to the work of Peter Nestler (b. Germany, 1937), in a programme showcasing the films he made together with his wife Zsóka Nestler (b. Hungary, 1944), as well as with other collaborators. This is one of the most important bodies of work in contemporary European documentary film, but up to now has been little known in Spain. The retrospective, entitled Es nahen andere Zeiten / Se acercan otros tiempos [Other Times are Coming], will also feature the presence in Pamplona of Peter Nestler himself. This is a film event at national level, which will subsequently be travelling to Barcelona (Filmoteca de Catalunya), Madrid (Cineteca), Coruña (CGAI) and Valencia (Filmoteca de Valencia).

Nestler, who has made over 60 films in his career, has had retrospectives at leading international institutions in Paris, London and New York, but this will be his first in Spain. Together with some of his essential titles, it will present recent finds and restorations from archives, as well as some of his recent work. A call for resistance, hope and change has been a constant in Peter and his partner and colleague Zsóka Nestler's work since they started making films in the early seventies. Politics, international struggles, immigrants and minorities' working conditions, the manufacturing process of things and materials, as well as a constant interest in popular art and music have been at the centre of much of his film work. The retrospective will include screenings of films like Am Siel (1962), Zigeuner sein (1970), Spanien! (1973), Die Judengasse (1988), Pachamama - nuestra tierra (1995) and Unrecht und Widerstand (2022), among others.

The Punto de Vista 2023 publication about Peter and Zsóka Nestler

Alongside the retrospective, the festival will be devoting a publication to Peter Nestler's work and that of some of his closest collaborators, so highlighting the collective nature of all his work. Texts, interviews and work documents connected with his work will be brought together for the first time in Spanish. The publication will include the shooting diary of one of Nestler's most recent films, Picasso en Vallauris (2021), written and illustrated by Bassem Pablo Al Bacha Fernandez, texts and interviews with Nestler and some of his collaborators (Zsóka Nestler, Rainer Komers, Reinald and Robert W. Schnell), several of his scripts and lavish graphic materials, all complemented by a documented filmography giving brief notes on his six decades of work. The second part of the publication will be a reproduction of a book with photographs and texts by Nestler and Reinald Schnell published in 1974, Bauern Malen Bilder / Los campesinos pintan cuadros [Peasants Paint Pictures]. In 1964, on his way to Greece, he heard about Kovacica, the village of the peasant painters. There, just as night was falling, they asked a man about a place to stay. They ended up in a guest house with straw mattresses, and there they discovered that this small locality had 17 working painters. They visited the village several times, getting to know the artists and their families and observing their work and their techniques. Nestler took photographs, Schnell took notes and from conversations between food, drink and paintings a book emerged, a book that is now being published for the first time in a language other than German, with colour reproductions of the paintings that, in the original edition, could only be printed in black and white for financial reasons.

The retrospective and the publication are the work of Portuguese programmer Ricardo Matos Cabo, responsible among other things for the Peter Nestler retrospective held in London in 2012 and 2013, and Argentinean programmer, critic and film-maker Lucía Salas, a member of the festival programming committee. The book is supported by the Goethe-Institut Madrid.

Opening session of the festival and Foco Punto de Vista

Two films from the retrospective will form the prologue to the series at the festival opening session on 27th March. These are Zeit (1992) and Die Donau Rauf (1970), films that raise topics fundamental to the retrospective – popular arts, on the one hand, and the layers of history and narrative that stand up to political injustice in the past, on the other. Both of them were also co-directed by Peter and Zsóka, as one of the aims of the retrospective is to recognise the fundamental role of Zsóka in the films she made together with her partner.

Finally, Nestler will also be the subject of one of the Focos Punto de Vista organised by the festival every month at the Filmoteca de Navarra, serving as an epilogue to the retrospective. This will consist of the films Stoff (I) and Die Römerstraße im Aostatal, the latter in an excellent version recently restored by the Deutsche Kinemathek.

Programme of the retrospective Es nahen andere Zeiten / Se acercan otros tiempos. Las películas de Peter Nestler [Other Times are Coming: The Films of Peter Nestler]

0. Festival opening
Die Donau Rauf by Peter Nestler & Zsóka Nestler (1969). 28 minutes

Zeit by Peter Nestler & Zsóka Nestler (1992). 43 minutes

Chilefilm by Peter Nestler & Zsóka Nestler (1974). 23 minutes

Mi Pais by Peter Nestler (1981). 7 minutes

Pachamama - nuestra tierra by Peter Nestler (1995). 90 minutes

Spanien! by Peter Nestler, Zsóka Nestler & Taisto Jalamo (1973). 43 minutes

Von Griechenland by Peter Nestler, in collaboration with Reinald Schnell (1965). 28 minutes

Zigeuner sein by Peter Nestler & Zsóka Nestler (1970). 47 minutes

Fos-sur-Mer by Peter Nestler & Zsóka Nestler (1972). 24 minutes

Das Warten by Peter Nestler (1985). 6 minutes

Die Nordkalotte by Peter Nestler (1991). 90 minutes

Unrecht und Widerstand by Peter Nestler (2022). 113 minutes