Venedig is a hypnotic experimental film shot in CinemaScope. It captures the city of Venice exclusively through images of reflections on water, with the warm hues of Agfacolor. Spectators who know Venice might wonder why they have never seen such wonderful reflections in the dirty canals of the Serenissima. Maybe Kurt Steinwendner used cinematic tricks? Watch, ponder and enjoy the unique experience of a ‘liquid screen’.
Steinwendner was one of the leading Austrian filmmakers in the 1950s and 1960s. His first short work Der Rabe (The Raven), made together with Wolfgang Kudrnovsky in 1951, is considered to be the first Austrian experimental film. In 1952 he released the feature film Wienerinnen (Women from Vienna) which was influenced by Italian Neorealism. With Venedig he won the Silberne Bär at the Berlinale in 1962.
Under the name Curt Stenvert, he also worked as a painter and installation artist and was invited to participate in the Art Biennale in Venice in 1966. Steinwendner/Stenvert is somebody to be rediscovered internationally for both the film and the art worlds.

Karl Wratschkov