Zyklon Portrait

This strangely beautiful, impressionistic documentary juxtaposes personal photographs and home movies with a scientific demonstration of how Zyklon B crystals become deadly gas (Zyklon B was the compound used in Nazi extermination chambers).

Elida Schogt was born in Princeton, NJ, and is of Dutch descent. She graduated from the University of Toronto with a BA in French Language and Literature and, more recently, received an MA in Media Studies from the New School for Social Research in New York, where she studied film production and theory. Her thesis, Juncture, Rupture: Trains, Film, Holocaust Memory, examines cinematic train imagery after W.W.II Her first film, Zyklon Portrait, is a clinical look at how the Nazis transformed Zyklon B gas from pesticide to genocidal weapon that gives way to the immensity of one family's loss. It is a Holocaust film without Holocaust imagery: family photographs, underwater photgraphy and hand-painted imagery draw a personal story out of historical minutiae. The film has screened internationally garnering prizes for Best Short and Best Editing at Hot Docs: Canadian International Documentary Festival; Best Documentary Debut at the New York Exposition for Short Film & Video; and, Special Mention at the International Documentary Festival Amsterdam (IDFA). Her follow-up film, The Walnut Tree, is a contemplation on photography and memory with personal stories from Nazi-occupied Holland. It is a piece that questions the ability of photographs to capture personal and collective memories. Elida is particularly interested in working with personal stories that reveal the relationship between history and memory. Wandering Tulip Productions 9 Wyndham Street Toronto, ON M6K 1R6 Canada Phone: 416-533-4561 Fax: 416-533-4565 Email address: wtp@interlog.com