Florian Thalhofer and Mahmoud Hamdy
for Goethe-Institute Cairo
People think a lot – about love.
To think about feeling is almost a paradox. Nevertheless people think about love – a lot. People in different cultures come up with all kinds of logics and rules to make sense of their feelings towards each other. Sometimes the thoughts might be exclusive to each other but if you listen to them, if you think about them, they all make sense.
Sometime in early 2002, Florian Thalhofer’s telephone rang. “This is the Goethe-Institute in Cairo, we have seven brand-new PCs and we have installed Flash on each of them. Would you like to come and give a workshop?” said the voice in the telephone – the voice of Enzio Wetzel.
“I have no clue about Flash and I don’t know much about PCs, either” Thalhofer replied, “but of course, I am happy to come!”.
This was the beginning of Thalhofer’s first project as a self-employed artist, after he finished University. Enzio Wetzel bundled him up with young egyptian artist and graphic designer Mahmoud Hamdy from Cairo. Hamdy and Thalhofer were similar in many ways. Graphic designers by education, film-makers by destiny. Together they started the LoveStoryProject, an interview-project in with people from Berlin and Cairo talking about Love.
Later the LoveStoryProject travelled further and filled up with Interviews from Singapore, Ireland, Israel and the States. The LoveStoryProject is not a finished project. Every now and then new interviews are added.
The LoveStoryProject was the first of two projects in which Thalhofer and Hamdy collaborated. They also worked together on 7sons, a Korsakow-film about a trip to the Beduins.
Watch Love Story Project