Grains of Sand
Filmed over eight years, Grains of Sand accompanies the filmmaker’s mother and mother-in-law, artists and close friends, as they enter their ninth decade. Through conversation, memories and artwork, along with reflections by the filmmaker herself, they create together this positive, different kind of “coming-of-age” story.
Margot and Barbara, close friends and artists, and the director’s mother & mother-in-law, meet for a work retreat in a stone farmhouse in the German countryside. They are both on the cusp of their ninth decade. As they begin to work on the large stones they have brought to sculpt, they embark on a conversation about creativity and aging, exploring what it means for them to arrive at this stage of their lives. Their wrinkled hands become dusty as they scrape and chisel the stones.
The farmhouse becomes a yearly ritual where the women share their pasts, discuss their artistic processes, and reflect on their changing roles as artists, women, and mothers. Margot and Barbara aren’t looking back on their lives. They are living them.
Sarah Gross, Director/Producer
Director and Producer Sarah Gross’ works have been shown in festivals around the world and broadcast on PBS nationally and Deutsche Welle internationally. Grains of Sand is her fourth feature-length documentary. Past films include documentary features Brown Bread and A Growing Thing and the documentary series Connection. Her production company Bugle Films is based in Berlin, Germany.
TELLING OUR STORIES: THE MEMOIR PROJECT
In the film, Barbara and Margot describe sometimes seemingly small events from earlier years. These memories continue to resonate for them now. It is less the facts but rather the atmosphere and feelings of earlier moments which help us understand who they are today. For the Telling Our Stories workshop, writing is used as a way of accessing memories, which we then unpack by sharing them in small groups. Our goal is to use our writing to reflect individually and as a group about how we can rediscover certain moments for ourselves or share them with others. Communities who make art together can learn something new about themselves and about those with whom they interact. We aim to build bridges among participants, creating opportunities for sharing and reflecting for ourselves about aging with purpose. How do we incorporate past moments into who we are now? And how do we share what is meaningful to us with others?
