Meet Dario Luis Sabina | Director, scriptwriter, cinematographer, visual artist, photographer

We had the good fortune of connecting with Dario Luis Sabina and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Dario Luis, have there been any changes in how you think about work-life balance?
Working in something you love, it’s easy to lose balance in the work-life relationship. That’s what happened to me. Additionally, I come from an Italian family where work was above all else. So for a long time, I prioritized work over all other aspects of my life. So much so that I couldn’t achieve this distinction between work and life; instead, life was within work, everything related to work took up most of my time, my work was my life.
Then life took care of starting to put things in their place, so now I’m in the process of balancing and being aware that there is work, a profession that you can love, and a life that nurtures this profession. At this particular moment in my life, I am on the path to finding balance.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
What can I say about my art? I’ve always loved cinema and visual arts, that blend of magic and technique. But it took me a long time in my life to realize that I could also be part of that universe: creating stories and bringing them to life by transforming them into images.

I believe we’re all different and we all have our peculiarities. What makes me proudest is the journey I’ve traveled. My original profession is as an automotive technician. After finishing high school, I embarked on a broad exploration of various artistic disciplines as a way to enrich myself, to be able to tell stories that reflect the human experience in all its facets. Understanding that everyone navigates their path as best they can, regardless of how they wish they could.
It wasn’t an easy path. First, I had to convince myself that I could do it. Then, I had to fight against all the internal resistance telling me this wasn’t for me, to resist the allure of well-paying jobs where I couldn’t truly express myself. The ultimate challenge was accepting myself as a writer, in the sense that I could start writing and actually finish something, overcoming the procrastination that has haunted me my entire life.

“At one point, I think my search boils down to finding the small scraps of time and unique actions in the most common places. Those points that are in plain sight but are often lost in the everyday. Another characteristic of my work is experimentation with time, whether it’s the time and internal narration of the characters or the formal development of techniques involving altering time in the technical aspect. Currently, I’m developing a technique that I call kinetic cubism, where I alter the time of a video fragment combined with the movement of objects in the frame to achieve an effect similar to cubism but endowed with movement.”

The lessons I’ve learned, and continue to learn, revolve around trusting life, letting go, releasing. These are things I learned with great pain and am still learning. I’m still a work in progress; in fact, I’m currently in a moment of intense transition in my life. Despite the journey I’ve traveled, I feel that the best, the greatest expression of my potential, is still yet to come.

Furthermore, at the moment I’m focused on two main projects. On one hand, I’m completely excited about developing a TV series of the fantasy genre. We’ve already filmed the pilot episode and we’re currently in discussions with various platforms to bring it to fruition. On the other hand, I’m working on the pre-production of my feature film ‘PUEBLO CHICO,’ which won the award for best first screenplay from the Argentine National Institute of Cinema and Audiovisual Arts (INCAA).”

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
The City of Buenos Aires is an exquisite blend of experiences. If a friend were to visit from abroad, I would take them primarily to the most traditional places, those spots not designed for tourism, where they can observe and experience life as it is. Steakhouses, pizzerias, home-style restaurants, notable bars, ice cream parlors – places tucked away in the city’s depths that rescue its true identity. I would take them on walks through different neighborhoods to provide them with the true feeling of being part of such an eclectic city like Buenos Aires. It experienced periods of splendor in the early 20th century, where the working classes could be part of the social fabric, creating an unprecedented middle class in Latin America by the mid-20th century. I would also take them to visit places that reflect the memory and horror of the 1970s with state terrorism. Places like the ESMA museum, a clandestine detention center where many people were tortured and killed. Above all, I believe the most interesting thing would be to take a bicycle and set out to explore, getting lost aimlessly in the beautiful tree-lined streets, open to the magic that each turn of the corner may bring.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
I feel like I walked a lonely path, but looking back, I’m grateful to my friends who have always been there and continue to support me in difficult times, to my different partners who have also always been by my side and seen my shadows up close, and to all those who never offered their support because they gave me more reasons to continue.
I’m going to mention some of the people who helped me along the way, risking leaving names out: My family, my friends Esteban, Claudio, Gonzalo, Lia, Paula, Vivi, Paloma, Loly, Fernando, Eduardo, Marta, Laura, Cynthia.

A book that really helped me a lot was – The artist way, by Julia Cameron, just the morning ritual of writing the 3 pages made such a great difference in my life.

Website: https://dariosabina.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dariosabina/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dario-sabina-294989a/

Other: https://Vimeo.com/dariosabina

Image Credits
Al images by DARIO SABINA