Grace Brass - Sunflowers

Sunflowers

When Nguyen approached me about Sunflowers, I was instantly in love with the project. The story was literally as if he had taken a wand to my head and pulled out memory after memory a la Harry Potter. I knew from the get go the vision he had and how to achieve it; and that I was one of the best people for the job.

I knew going into to this that a large aspect of the film was based on an Asian American story. As such, I invited members of the creative team to critique my work regularly and give input. Considering how personal this story is though, I had an understanding of the characters simply from a story perspective and growing up at the daughter of an immigrant.

The main inspiration for the aesthetic of Sunflowers is unsurprisingly, Van Gogh. Beginning with the title the story is also about an artist that struggles to find acceptance and ultimately ends her own life. Continuing from there, the characters reflect the passage of time and stages of grief in the colors of the sky over the course of day. The rooms and locations have colors based on Van Gogh paintings.

I tried to invoke the impressionist style of creation in the process of building this world. In that, I tried to make what I thought an impressionist film would be. I, as white hispanic person, had an impression of what Himawari, an Asian American person, was going through. My impression, my view was the guiding vision of world these characters live in. Something I am truly grateful to be a part of.

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