CURRICULUM VITAE

Lily van den Bergh dutch version

Lily van den Bergh

Lily van den Bergh was an announcer for Dutch radio and television in the late sixties. She presented a cultural affairs radio programme and worked as an editor for a cultural affairs programme for Dutch NOS television. She appeared as an actress in several Dutch feature films.
From 1970-1975 she contributed to a number of Dutch weekly magazines as a freelance journalist.
Under a grant from the Ministry of Culture, she conducted a study of cable television and non-commercial video in Canada and the US, producing a report on these media (1973).

After several years of teaching pupils and advising primary and secondary schools about audio-visual media, she founded an audio-visual centre for non-commercial organisations, artists and cultural workshops:
Open Studio Video-Centrum (now the largest non-commercial audio-visual centre in Amsterdam). During her ten years as manager of Open Studio, Lily van den Bergh made some 15 video documentaries for social and educational purposes.
In 1984 she directed the documentary ‘The Raging Dutchman’ (De Razende Hollander) (87 min, 1984) - produced by Open Studio - about the struggle for survival of the last civilian shipyard in Amsterdam.
- Special screening for old ex-shipbuilders at former NDSM shipyard in Amsterdam (2013)

In 1985 she founded a professional film and television production company Open Studio Producties (Open Studio Productions), for which she has (co-) produced and/or directed the following films:

‘The Post-Office’ (Het Postkantoor) (20 min, 1985)
Produced by Lily van den Bergh
Directed by Peter van Wijk
A dramatised documentary at the request of the City of Amsterdam

‘The Life of a Midwife’ (Uit het Leven van een Vroedvrouw) (40 min, 1987)
Produced by Lily van den Bergh
Directed by Nouchka van Brakel
A television documentary, about the special and privileged position of midwives in Holland (a co-production with IKON-television)

‘Revolt in Sobibor’ (Opstand in Sobibor) (35 mm, 128 min, 1989)
Directed by Lily van den Bergh & Pavel Kogan
Produced by Lily van den Bergh for Open Studio Producties
& Leningrad Documentary Film Studio

Between 1986 and 1989 Lily van den Bergh made the first Dutch-Russian co-production with the well-known Russian co-director Pavel Kogan, whom she met at the Leipzig Film Festival.
‘Revolt in Sobibor’ was filmed in seven different countries and six different languages. They travelled with a Russian crew (camera man: Sergey Skvortsov) to interview the witnesses of the most successful, yet totally unknown revolt of Jewish inmates in a Polish death camp during World War II.

Financed by the Dutch Film Fund and the VARA television (Public TV), ‘Revolt in Sobibor’ has been broadcasted twice on Dutch TV, several times in the former Soviet Union, seven times in Russia, in Belgium, in Israel and in 1993 through La Sept/Arte (Grand Format) simultaneously in France and Germany.
This 35 mm documentary has been shown in the commercial movie theatres and at a number of Film Festivals all over the world.
‘Revolt in Sobibor’ was awarded the 2nd Prize of the Joris Ivens Award at the International Documentary Film Festival in Amsterdam (IDFA 1989), the prize of the Amsterdam Cultural Council (1990) and was selected by the Dutch Government in 1991 for competition in the 63rd Annual Academy Awards (Oscar).
-  Recent screenings:  Film Festival 'Filmer à Tout Prix' in Brussels (2006), 'Warsaw Jewish Film Festival' (2013)

‘Second Time Around’ (Huishoudens van Steen) (16 mm, 48 min, 1991)
Produced by Lily van den Bergh
Directed by Kees Hin
A documentary about the re-use of old discarded buildings, in this case a former city hospital in Amsterdam which was renovated into housing, artist's studios and commercial space. The City Council originally planned to demolish the old, evacuated hospital buildings, but local residents and people that squatted the pavilions, preventing the demolition, took care of the maintenance. An interesting example how residents and users succeeded to influence and even reverse the unfortunate plans of the City Council.
‘Second Time Around’ was made with the assistance of the University of Amsterdam and financed by the Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment; the Province of North Holland; The City of Amsterdam: dep. City-renovation and Housing & Urban Development.
- special screening at the occasion of 25th anniversary of the preservation of former municipal hospital WG (2009)

Between 1990 and 1992 Lily van den Bergh produced a monthly television program for Multicultural Amsterdam Radio and Television on the Amsterdam cable, giving Film Academy students a chance to develop their skills.

‘Inverted Perspective’ (Het Omgekeerd Perspectief) (35mm, 110 min, 1996)
Directed by Lily van den Bergh
Produced by Lily van den Bergh
This documentary is Lily van den Bergh's second co-production with a Russian-Dutch crew, which she also directed.
The main protagonist Olga Sergevna, a Russian teacher of English language, stayed with her son Aleg and friend Sergey a few summer months in the Amsterdam apartment of the film director. Presented with the unique opportunity to observe them closely and to follow them in their day-to-day trials and tribulations, she decided to film their reactions and views on Western society in comparison to their Russian way of life.
‘Inverted Perspective’ was subsidised by the National Dutch Film Fund.
The première of the film was at the Dutch Film Festival in Utrecht in 1996. A short version was made and broadcasted by Dutch public broadcast IKON-television in September 1997 and has been sold to various European TV Channels.
‘Inverted Perspective’ was also shown in the Dutch cinemas in March 1997.
It was nominated in the category Best International Documentary over 60 minutes at the Hot Docs! Festival in Toronto (1997), screened in competition at the International Documentary Festival in Munich (1997), the International Women's Film Festival in Minsk (1997) and DokumentART in Neubrandenburg (1997) & Jury member atDokumentArt Film Festival in 1998. Recent screenings: Film Festival Flahertiana in Perm Russia & Jury member (2012 )

‘Saved Tools’ or ‘Can you send me 60 saws and 12 sewing machines?’
(Kunt U mij 60 Zagen en 12 Naaimachines sturen?)
(Digibeta, 50 min, 1999/2000)
Directed and produced by Lily van den Bergh.
‘Saved Tools’ is a film about small scale development aid. This documentary portrays Dutch volunteer organisations, such as Gered Gereedschap (Saved Tools) which collects used tools and ships them to organisations, cooperatives and schools in Africa, Asia and Latin America. The film follows the donated tools: They are being used by artists in a sculpture collective in Zimbabwe, pupils of a school for the Disabled in Ghana and by the Association of Widows and Orphans in Burkina Faso, who are making clothes with Dutch sewing machines.
No footage of human misery, emergency food or old winter clothes - the impression that most people have about life on the African continent - but energetic hard working people, trying to become independent of western aid.
A short version of the film (32 min) was broadcasted in April 1999 by Belgian TV (Lichtpunt). The long version (50 min) has been broadcasted in April 2000 by Dutch Public Broadcast EO-TV.
- special screening at the occasion of 25th anniversary of the preservation of former municipal hospital WG (2009)

Lily van den Bergh has been a member of the board of the Dutch Artists Union and a representative of the International Federation of Film and Television Unions (FISTAV). She has a daughter and lives in Amsterdam.

Contact:
Phone: +31-20-6223661
Fax: +31-20-6275090
E-mail:info@openstudioproducties.nl