by Oeke Hoogendijk, Netherlands 2021, 84''
Presented at Notti di Mezza Estate 12th Edition, 2022Since 2014, the travelling exhibition Crimea - Gold and Treasures of the Black Sea, in which numerous archaeological artefacts from various Crimean museums are exhibited, has been stationary in the cellars of the Allard Pierson Museum in Amsterdam and cannot return home. Those treasures have become the subject of a power struggle between the museums of Crimea, now annexed by Russia, and the government of Ukraine. Both sides claim the archaeological collection as their own. The Netherlands has unwittingly become an arbitrator: to whom should the treasures be returned? The film follows the affair and the different stages of the court proceedings that have not yet led to a final outcome.
Oeke Hoogendijk (1961) is an international documentary filmmaker. He made his debut with The Saved (1998), which won the Dutch Academy Award 'Het Gouden Beeld' in 1998 and the 'Euro - Comenius Award' in Vienna (1999). His second film, The Holocaust Experience (2002), premiered at IDFA 2002 and was selected for numerous festivals in Europe and the USA. For ten years, Hoogendijk followed the renovation of the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, on which he made a series of four episodes and the film The New Rijksmuseum - The Film (2014), which won numerous awards, Golden Calf at the Netherlands Film Festival, the Prix D'Italia, the Prix du Meilleur Documentaire at the Festival International du Film Montreal, and Best Dutch Documentary at IDFA 2014, and had its Italian premiere at the Schermo dell'arte.
Filmography:
The Saved (1998); The Holocaust Experience (2002); The New Rijksmuseum eps. I & 2 (2008); The New Rijksmuseum eps. 3 & 4 (2013); The New Rijksmuseum - The Film (2014); Marten & Oopjen, Portrait of a Marriage (2019); My Rembrandt (2019); Housewitz (2021); The Treasures of Crimea (2021).