
Aryan Kaganof
Directing
Biography
Aryan Kaganof is a South African film maker, novelist, poet and fine artist.
Known For

Twentysomething innocents Jacqui and Martijn move to Amsterdam and immerse themselves in the intense and drug-laden underground club scene. Life turns out to be far more complicated, difficult, and dangerous than they bargained for. Their relationship is tested - repeatedly.
Wasted!

Fugitive Jack is doing everything in his power to evade both the police and gangsters. Assuming he’s in the clear, he moves in with Keiko, a pornstar whose early life in an abusive family still haunts her.
Tokyo Elegy

Based on the writings of: J.G. Ballard, Charles Manson, Jeffrey Dahmer, Henry Rollins, Roberta Lannes, Edmund Emil Kemper, etc. The structure of this film is literally that of the title: ten monologues adapted from various fiction and documentary sources which combine to produce an unsettling work that does not pretend to analyse nor to understand the serial killers.
Ten Monologues from the Lives of the Serial Killers

Howard and Selene are two English-speaking foreigners living in Amsterdam who begin a casual affair that turns serious and then starts to deteriorate. It is the second part in Aryan Kaganof's Urban Wasteland Serial.
The Mozart Bird

This film was shot entirely in Rotterdam and shows the German couple David (Helmut Berger) and Tanya (Sheri Hagen) who are kept by Ludwig (Udo Kier), David's half-brother. Ludwig has some dubious business to do and so he is staying in the port for a while. David and Tanya have followed him and are staying in a hotel. They pass the time committing robberies. When David finds a photo of an attractive young man among the booty of a robbery, his life is turned upside down. He will have to close the door on a suffocating past.
Under the Palms

"Love is the only thing subject to negotiation in feature film debut which betrays admiration for the formal rigidity of Straub and Zwartjes." "The film, KYODAI MAKES THE BIG TIME, caused a commotion in the Netherlands when it won the Golden Calf for Best Film (the Dutch Oscar equivalent). The film went on to win the Jozef Von Sternberg Prize For Innovative Narrative Structure at the Mannheim Film Festival." "KYODAI MAKES THE BIG TIME – What was the public’s reaction to this? Your first film – is it like your first time having sex? Which I guess is a subjective question, but I’m thinking experimental, unnerving, liberating, a learning experience, a humbling experience, leaving you wanting more ? SEX SHOULD ALWAYS BE LIKE YOU'RE HAVING SEX FOR THE FIRST TIME."
Kyodai Makes the Big Time
Filmmaker Aryan Kaganof goes behind the scenes of Matthew Barney's impossible to find short "March of the Anal Sadistic Warrior (1998)."
Matthew Barney: Creating Stories

In this documentary Kerkhof takes the viewer into a bizarre underworld, the sub-culture of blood art and body piercing performance art. Kerkhof's camera registered a performance by the American blood artist Ron Athey which took place during the FREAK ZONE festival in Lille, France in May 1997. The camerawork is so freaky one would almost suspect it is under the influence of heroin. The film includes interviews with Athey as well as shocking live fragments wherein Athey works his face over with injection needles. The crazy, maniacal clamour of the HIV positive priest/performer gives us insights into the motives and goals of this group of masochistic performance artists. Somebody who entertains his audience by cutting and stabbing himself; is this art? Who can say? What is beyond question is that Kerkhof's masterful use of the camera and editing not only obscures the images but also the boundary between art and unbearable filth.
Ron Athey Is the Trojan Whore
1991 experimental short by Aryan Kaganof, made under his birth name: Ian Kerkhof
Carnage in the Charnel House
Elelwani is a young university-educated woman who has been brought up in an environment steeped in tradition. Her parents have promised her hand in marriage to the Vendaking and, as a dutiful daughter, she wants to obey their wishes. But in order to fulfil her promise, Elelwani must abandon her dreams of travel, further education and – most importantly – her commitment to her one true love.
Elelwani
Oedipus and Punishment (2005) is an adaptation of a pre-existent sketch in Aryan Kaganof's early masterpiece Ten Monologues from the Lives of the Serial Killers (1994), which the auteur made when he still went by his birth name 'Ian Kerkhof.' The film features a monologue from American serial killer Edmund Kemper who is noted for his imposing size and high intelligence, standing 6 ft 9 inches (2.06 m) and weighing over 300 pounds (140 kg), and having an IQ in the 140 range – attributes that left his victims with little chance to overcome him.
Oedipus and Punishment: An Interview with Edmund Emil Kemper

Documentary about and with the Japanese electronic composer and artist Merzbow.
Beyond Ultra Violence: Uneasy Listening by Merzbow

The film opens with a rubber-clad woman stepping sensuously out of a limousine. The camera lovingly closes-up on her stilletoed foot... She enters a dark desolate warehouse, and meets two men, who proceed to chain her up and worship her body. Originally projected on three screens simultaneously. Music by legendary noise musician Merzbow.
The Sequence of Parallel Bars
The Dead Man returns, but it's too late to save us. We are already dead.
The Dead Man 2: Return of the Dead Man
1991 experimental short by Aryan Kaganof, made under his birth name: Ian Kerkhof
Egmond Ghost Poem
Venom And Eternity For Dummies (2012) is a tribute to letterist poet Isidore Isou (On Venom and Eternity). The film utilizes excerpts from Kaganof's own first feature Kyodai Makes the Big Time (1992).
Venom And Eternity For Dummies

“Click Here to Unsubscribe”, Aryan Kaganof’s latest short film, commemorates the revolutionary values of May ’68, 40 years on. This outstanding film had its world premiere in Johannesburg on March 15th 2008, a few days after its author settled in Sweden. We were very proud to see our name in the acknowledgements at the end as we’ve always emphasised the cinematographic legacy of Guy Debord, one of this resurrection’s spiritual leaders, in Kaganof’s work. The film starts with a quotation from Debord dating back to 1956 about cinematographic cut-ups, which were also essential to our latest film. Kaganof has re-invented the cut-up technique for this film, transforming the “random” aspect of the editing into an area of reflection and synthesis
Click Here to Unsubscribe
This is a never released piece of video art created by Aryan Kaganof when he still went by his birth name 'Ian Kerkhof' based on an installation he created in 'tribute' to Dutch actress Sylvia Kristel. Part doc and part video art, there is certainly a sort of tragic and forlorn tone to film that seems to sum up Kaganof's thoughts on Kristel's life and career.
Sylvia Kristel, Jaren Later...

Short film in which a group of children get to know the Enge Knijperman (the Grisly Pincher Man) who falls madly in love with the Onderstebovenvrouw (Upside-down Woman). However the 220-Volt-Witch and the Toilet Slave set out to spoil things. Experimental short by Aryan Kaganof, made under his birth name Ian Kerkhof.
The Creepy Pegman and The Upsidedown Woman
Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones (2002) is the fifth of seven films in Kaganof's The Suprematist Compositions. These compositions are concerned with the nature of deity and are Kaganof's own personal favorites of his voluminous work, clearly inspired by the work of Kandinsky and Malevich. Synopsis: A slowly evolving re-mix experiment that seeks to fuse sound and image so that the eye hears and the ear sees. Featuring music by: Kraftwerk, Air, Underground Resistance, Thomas Heckmann, Ryoji Ikeda