Nicolás Cadby is a filmmaker, performer, and interdisciplinary artist invested in building community and advocating for the intrinsic value of artmaking as a practice. He was a DC Posse Scholar, got his Bachelor of Arts in Film and Media Studies and Documentary Storymaking from Lafayette College, and has a wide range of experience with local and international non-profits. In addition to being an assistant in Scripted TV at Creative Artists Agency, he works as a writer, director, editor, and cinematographer on both scripted and documentary films, and has a diverse background in acting, theatre, still photography, music, songwriting and vocal performance.
Artist Statement
I believe the only truly worthwhile endeavors that a human being can pursue on this earth are to explore one’s own mind, to pursue knowledge, to fight for the oppressed, and to make art. These are arguably different means to the same end: to understand the love within and between us, the earth, and those we encounter in this life.
I love to explore all of the distinct crafts involved in telling stories with images and sounds, and all of the diverse sandboxes in which this art form can play. From the dream-work on the page, to the immediacy of the camera, to the experimentation, and then focus of the edit.
Ultimately, my work is molded by two guiding questions: What is it that I’m trying to say, and how does it nourish? First, I have to understand the foundations of the medium in which I’m working so I can bend it in the direction of what I’m engaging with. And second, crucially, I try to always let the what and the how of my work spring up from the why. Why am I making this? Who might it harm? Who might it nourish? Often the answer is me: I use my art to understand myself better, and to be able to show others how I experience the world. I believe, though, that visual storytelling specifically, in an age of infinite technological reproducibility, has the potential to nourish on a previously unfathomable scale.