Alessandro Avataneo

Alessandro Avataneo (1977) is an Italian author, film and theatre director, activist, and professor.
Working in many countries between Europe, North America, and Japan, he holds a degree in International Relations and Diplomacy and master degrees in Storytelling, Performing Arts, Animation, and Digital Entertainment.
Founder of numerous projects, including Hypercritic magazine and international media company.
== Biography ==
He studied in Trieste and Turin and graduated from the University of Turin with a degree in International Relations and Diplomacy. His research thesis, Art and International Relations from Alexander the Great to Stanley Kubrick (2004), is a pioneering work on art as an effective democratization tool, peacebuilding, and integration on an international level.
In 1998-2000 at the Scuola Holden of Turin he attended the Master in Storytelling and Performing Arts, where he studied with Alessandro Baricco, Abraham Yehoshua, Stefano Benni, Dario Voltolini, Giuseppe Tornatore, Carlo Lucarelli, Daniele Del Giudice, and Harold Bloom. 
In 2005 he achieved a second Master in Animation, VFX, and Digital Entertainment at Virtual Reality & Multi Media Park in Turin, and after it, he worked at Lumiq Studios VFX department, under the supervision of Bob Keen, for the international production Gilgamesh, an 80million budget fantasy epic, canceled in 2006.
In the following years, he took part in several advanced training courses, including the Scriptwriting workshop with Guillermo Arriaga (Turin, 2006) and, in 2010, the Torino Film Lab advanced European Scriptwriting workshop, between Bratislava, Brigognan, and Turin, where he developed a Spaghetti Western inspired by Beppe Fenoglio short stories. 
== Career ==
From 2000 onwards Avataneo carried out design, organization, and direction of major events for the protection and enhancement of the historical and artistic Heritage of the Residences of the Royal House of Savoy, for the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities, under the superintendence of Environmental and Architectural Heritage.
Consultant to the Italian and Dutch governments on projects for the protection of material and immaterial Heritage, he has collaborated with cultural institutions such as the Museo Egizio of Turin, Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo, Tate Gallery, the The European Fine Art Fair, and the Residences of the Royal House of Savoy, curating over the years numerous events within UNESCO sites.
In the Netherlands, Avataneo directed the multimedia installations for the 2010 International Biennale Architecture (Internationale Biënnale Leegstand Herbestemming), Vacant Properties and Redevelopment, in Maastricht, and produced the official film of the Expo.
In Maastricht, he designed an international gastronomic event for the MECC (Maastrichs Expositie en Congress Centrum). He wrote a dossier with a ten-year strategy for Maastricht 2018 European Capital of Culture, commissioned by the Government of Limburg, and teached as visiting professor at Zuyd University of Applied Sciences.
From 2005 to 2008, he was responsible for the Cinema Office and International Office team member at the University of Gastronomic Sciences in Pollenzo. He has contributed to the design and organization of the journey Alla Ricerca del Grande Fiume, a tribute to the writer Mario Soldati, with 153 students traveled by bicycle and by ship along the Po (river), crossing 4 regions, 13 provinces, and 82 municipalities with conferences, lectures, and events to study the river and its tributaries’ ecosystem.
He also co-designed, organized, and led national and international study trips in Quebec, British Columbia, California, Japan, Scotland, Ireland, France, Hungary, Germany, and all Italian regions, leading his students to discover food communities and artisanal productions.
Together with German director Thomas Struck, he supervised the production of Pasta Connection, a documentary on pasta and Camorra culture in Gragnano, produced by the University of Gastronomic Sciences and presented at the Culinary Cinema section of the 59th Berlin International Film Festival, in 2009. In the following years, he directed and co-produced documentaries and TV formats on food culture with German producer and friend Peter Naguschewski.
Alessandro Avataneo has been teaching at Scuola Holden since 2012.https://scuolaholden.it/albodocenti/alessandro-avataneo
He currently holds various courses across the two-year master degree in filmmaking, the two-year master in writing for television, the two-year international master in storytelling, and the three-year university degree in creative writing.
From 2017 to 2018 he coordinated the Cinema Department together with Italian scriptwriter Sara Benedetti, Italian director Andrea Tomaselli and producer Daniele De Cicco.
He conducted the masterclasses with Eric M. Lang, Anthony E. Zuiker, Laura Morante, and Paolo Conte.
He was a lecturer in the Storytelling Masterclass at the 48th edition of the Giffoni Film Festival.https://www.giffonifilmfestival.it/23-luglio-giffoni2018/item/6503-alessandro-avataneo-ai-masterclasser-fare-cinema-e-sempre-un-atto-politico.html
Avataneo has been involved in startup and innovative realities for the Contemporary Humanities: he is the founder and director of the Cluster&Stampede Company and the Film&Storytelling Atelier, and he is a co-founder and director of the game design studio A.C.M.E. Games Limited.
After more than ten years of incubation, in the 2020, Avataneo’s Hypercritic project became a reality. Hypercritic is an archive, an interactive museum, a tool of discovery, and cultural empowerment. Its beta version website was launched on July 11, on the 90th anniversary of Harold Bloom, an inspirational figure of the project. Currently, Avataneo is the Hypercritic CEO.
=== Cinema, Theatre and Television ===
Avataneo produced four feature films and documentaries. In collaboration with Lindsay Kemp, he directed the opera-movie Leghorn (2017), which shown the Livorno’s city through its port, monuments, people and traditions, with the Pietro Mascagni masterpieces. In the occasion of the 2017 Torino Film Festival, he presented Il grande Oz, a documentary about the childhood illnesses, realized over eight years in collaboration with CasaOz onlus.
Avataneo also directed Poema Circular (2014) and Una Storia delle Colline (2009) about the Wine in the Langhe rural word.
He is the author of television formats, video clips, art installations, and virtual reality presented in national and international festivals.
He has made numerous documentaries and short films. Love Shards (2016) one of the first Italian short films shot in Virtual reality, Il Cratere (2015), a survey on the earthquake in L’Aquila in collaboration with the German TV, and Todo Cambia (2015), which opened the Human Rights International Film Festival in Todi in 2017.
He also directed the original musical 6comeNoi (2012), realized with young actors from the Turin suburbs.
=== Publications ===
He published the novel Una Storia delle Colline (2009) and The Italian Wine Atlas (2015), written with Vittorio Manganelli and now in its third edition.
Avataneo is the first author to have published in America and Asia a comparative study on Federico Fellini and Hayao Miyazaki authorized by Fondazione Fellini and Studio Ghibli, feature on 100Points, Robert Parker (wine critic) cultural magazine (2015).
== Bibliography ==
=== Cinema, Theatre and Television ===
* In the Beginning there was (2000), live action short.
* The Crib (2002), documentary live action.
* The Openess (2003), 35mm short tribute to Rainer Maria Rilke poems.
* Electric Show (2004), documentary.
* TAC (2004), documentary.
* Ascension (2004), documentary tribute to T. S. Eliot.
* Smooth (2004), audiovisual short for an Italian Fashion brand. 
* Cronosisma 3 (2004), fusional theatre from the adaptation of Kurt Vonnegut Jr's novels.
* Run On (2005), music video.
* Chimerica (2005), theatre show.
* Prospero (2006), University of Gastronomic Sciences corporate video.
* Pasta Connection (2008), documentary.
* Bento (2010), pilot of TV format on traditional gastronomic icons.
* In Viva Morte Morta Vita Vivo (2010), animation produced for the exhibition of Glenn Brown paintings - Tate and Fondazione Sandretto. 
* Machinarivm (2010), commercial for FIAT-Chrysler.
* The Candel (2010), short movie.
* Una Storia delle Colline (2006), documentary
* 6ComeNoi (2012), musical theatre show and film. 
* Bruno Leoni (2013), biographic documentary.
* Poema Circular (2014), musical and surrealist film.
* Il Grande Oz (2017), documentary.
* Frigo Swing (2015), web series.
* Todo Cambia (2015), short film commissioned by United Nations.
* Leghorn (2017), film commissioned by MEDIA sub-programme of Creative Europe.
=== Publications ===
* Una Storia delle Colline (2009), Sole24Ore Editore. EAN 9788871796178.
* The Atlas of Italian Wine (2015), Libreria Geografica. ISBN 8869853624.
==In the media==
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== References ==
== External links ==
Category:Italian people
Category:Italian educators
Category:Italian authors
Category:Italian film directors
Category:Italian activists