Trajo, Experimental Ethnographic Film, 2027
Niculae “Ciotoi” Dumitru
Trajo is a film featuring violinist Nicu Ciotoi, which uses music to explore the culture and history of the Romani people, Europe’s largest yet most marginalized racial minority. Taking its title from the Romani word for “life,” the film turns away from traditional, often exploitative modes of ethnographic documentation, adopting a speculative, experimental lens to reimagine how history might be heard otherwise.
“Trajo, like Romani music itself, reclaims narrative power, positioning the stories of suffering and survival encoded in Romani music as central to history-making, alongside written and archival records,” shared Costache. “The film reminds us that sound and personal memory work to redress an incomplete, hegemonic historical record. In this way, Trajo underscores how art can push back against, or even undo, the dehumanization that has long underpinned the erasure of Romani life—biopolitically, culturally, and historiographically.”
https://arts.stanford.edu/faculty-seed-grants-bloom-into-artistic-breakthroughs/