Leonie Cecilie
From elixir recipes to the magic of Deliveroo and the flat grey filter of London, Leonie Cecilie discusses her latest short film ‘Drage’, and the scam of artistic integrity – “I am still stupid and listening.” Meet Left Girl.
Describe the best night of your life, or if you don’t’ have one then describe what you think the best night of your life would look like
Unfortunately, I can’t go into details about past experiences because my dad will read this, and he said he would take me to Siberia for a cold withdrawal (whatever that means) if he ever saw or heard me doing anything suspicious so I will paint a picture of my dream night: Behind our house in my village there is a field with a big bench. We call it “Sonnenbank” (sun-bench). In summer, we sit there every night to watch the sunset. It kind of is a tradition to sit there with friends, drink wine and have revelations. It would be my dream to bring my day-one London friends to the sun-bench and experience one summer night with them and my best friends from home together.
You’re from a village near Hamburg. Can you tell us a bit about your childhood there? Do you think it influences your work?
Yes, it’s a tiny village called Drage, which is in between the Northern and Baltic Sea. It is the most beautiful and depressing place on Earth. Obviously, it was heaven to grow up in nature, surrounded by animals and so many things to explore. My friends and I would make up magic elixir recipes with herbs and berries we found in the garden. We all were neighbours so we could just walk over to meet and play. I think it was pretty much heaven until I started school. School was hell for me from start to finish. I have severe ADHD (only found out last year) so sitting inside all day - quiet and still - really wasn’t it. In Germany, you really are never supposed to speak your mind so not understanding this caused me to get into a lot of trouble. Honestly, I have no clue how I managed to graduate High-school, I guess my biggest motivation was to leave my village asap. And I did, I moved to London straight after. It wasn’t planned but I got a job as a nanny and had nothing better to do so I left and never returned.
People always argue whether village or city live is more isolating: if you have ever been an unpopular teenager in a village - you know. I basically spent my entire teenage years on Tumblr, watching movies and sleeping. There wasn’t public transport and my friends lived far away so I became very good at dreaming. My philosophy teacher once gave me a B despite never participating in lesson, she said that she really liked how I was dreaming and looking outside the window.
My favourite shows at the time were 90210, Gossip Girl and Skins - so I basically I grew up in Beverly Hills, New York and Bristol. My parents never limited us in any way, they really pushed all our crazy ideas, so I am really lucky they believed in me and my decision to study in London. City life is so exciting to me still. Deliveroo to me is magic and I don’t think I can leave this behind me anytime soon.
Although I love being in London, home to me is the most special place. When I go, I feel the most inspired - it’s so peaceful and quiet. The lighting is phenomenal, and I think most of my work really depends on natural lighting. London has this flat grey filter and I always feel like something is missing in the work I produce in the city. Also, I love to work with my family and portray my siblings. I have been doing projects with them for many years, so they know exactly what to do and we feel comfortable with each other. They really inspire most of my work, it’s like I am now simply trying to document little fragments of our life in the village, situations that I never thought were unusual but now that I am removed from that life, they make me feel nostalgic and something I want to capture.
What are some key inspirations for you?
What inspires me is to live a good life and make sure all my loved ones do too. I think artistic integrity is a scam and was made up by some bored aristocrats. My parents definitely taught me to enjoy life very early on, even when we didn’t have much, my mum would surprise us with nice things to make us feel special. We always had everything but money. My parents both have amazing taste and are super creative. My dad is obsessed with music, cameras (he bought my mum a Contax T3 20 years ago!), shoes and coats. We grew up listening to Miles Davis and Kraftwerk on speakers which he built himself. My mum studied history of art and was a framer for many years. She started doing ceramics a few years ago and is selling her work globally now. She truly is the most talented craftswomen on the planet. They both brought and continue to bring so much to our lives that I don’t ever feel like I am lacking inspiration. They had really horrible childhoods and found each other super early (my mum was 18 and my dad 16) and have created this beautiful life together. Seeing how much they have overcome together and how much they believe in each other - in us - really is what motivates me to do anything today.
List your three favourite songs or podcasts at the moment
Pour up - Yaya Bey
My Love - Hawa
Sunny - Boney M
Do you think you’d be a bridezilla?
Actually, I told my boyfriend three days ago that I want to get married in Las Vegas - for obvious reasons - and because we are both really shy. I have been planning my outfit for the past 20 years and truly, it’s the only thing that motivates me to get married. So I will spend the whole day getting ready and then we go to the Chapel at 9pm and queue up for our turn and he can take pictures in front of the Neon lights all night.
If you entered a beauty pageant, what would your special talent be?
Giving Restaurant recommendations xx
Can you introduce us to your latest short film?
Talking about my work is the hardest for me. Honestly, all I want is to make a nice film that my family and friends like. For my final film, I envisioned a summer night kind of feel to it but the weather was horrible, so I focused on showing what we try to do to keep sane when it’s bad weather in the village (which is 350 days a year). It wasn’t my intention to make a happy or sad film, I just wanted to portray what life as a young person looks like in the village. To me it was obviously nothing special growing up, but when I started making films about my siblings and village life my London, my friends were all super intrigued and it kind of made me look at it in a different way. Now that I am removed from it, I can see it really is different and very bizarre. I am young and I don’t think I have lived enough to make big statements - I am still stupid and listening. So, all I can do for now, is to document and recreate moments special to me - and that’s exactly what I tried to do with ‘Drage’.
Tell me a bit about the making of the film.
It was really bad to be honest. It was raining non-stop for two weeks. My whole plan was to use the light and sun in my village but there wasn’t any, so I was really upset. For a good two weeks, I was doing almost nothing but eating my mum’s food whilst watching movies in my bed. It was a bit depressing really. After giving up on my vision, I decided to film at night and indoors. We went to a tent party (something very traditional in my area) and started filming there. Everyone was so excited, and I guess that’s what motivated me to keep going. In the last two days, I just filmed nonstop - intense time pressure really is the only thing motivating me, unfortunately.
I think the audio, for me, is a big part of why I find it so impacting. The first time I watched it, we were in a room full of people and the audio transported me into the scenes you’d curated before my eyes. What inspired the film’s audio?
The audio is by my friend Daniel Wackett. We lived together 5 years ago. It was my first own room in London, in a house-share in Plumstead. The music was what I was thinking about before even starting to think about the story. It was really important to me, and it seemed impossible to find someone, so I asked for help on Instagram and Daniel replied. As I already knew how good he was, it felt like a perfect match. He sent me a few samples and we both picked the same one in the end, so I guess that was the smoothest part of the whole process.
What’s next for you? Is there anything else at all you’d like to add?
So, I started my own nail business during Covid because my other jobs basically disappeared because of the pandemic. It was something I always loved and so I just did it. My amazing and brave friends let me practice on them and I started having clients shortly after. I have been working for magazines and shows since but sitting with the girls for hours and changing the designs 10 times is what makes it so special to me. I have met so many beautiful people. So yes, please check out my account @bebeynails. I haven’t posted much the last year because I was in final year and started a job straight after, but please message me if you need some crazy nails!
Next month I will graduate from CSM officially, after doing Fashion Communication and Promotion for 4 years. Currently, I am working on a super exciting project as a junior Art director and it is definitely something that I see myself doing for the next few years - until I grow up, and then I might make a film again.
interview KATE KIDNEY BISHOP
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