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Kaitlyn Liddicoat is a junior here in the School of Film and Television, a school within the University of Arizona’s Bachelor's of Fine Arts Program, which has just been ranked within the Top 10 Best Film Schools in the country, according to The Wrap; an American media company covering the business of entertainment and media.
Regarding public universities, the UA ranks the second best in film, behind UCLA.
Liddicoat's fascination for film came from her admiration for the arts, ”I was actually a theater kid growing up, so I obviously was very supportive of the arts,” Liddicoat said.
“[As] I got older, I started thinking in high school, maybe I gotta start looking at a career that's more like STEM based. And where I came from, Wisconsin, there [were] just not a lot of film based classes most of the time. But my mom, she saw that I wasn't exactly super happy about [STEM], and she said, ‘Well, why don't you just go into film? You've always been interested in it.’ And now I'm here.”
Liddicoat talks about her entrance into the Film and Television program, “In order to get into the BFA Film and Television [program], we have to submit 10 photos of a portrait of some sort of subject,” Liddicoat said.
“I decided for [myself] that I wanted to do it on what makes a woman and the experiences that women always have to take and face various ages and everything like that. I talked to a lot of my fellow women my age and even a little bit older, along with just experiences that I had working as a female in just sometimes a patriarchal world, and the experiences that we all had, I drew that together for inspiration.”
Liddicoat’s project, Untitled, contains a repeating motif of mirrors, “I submitted a reflection [in each picture] to mean something within yourself,” Liddicoat said.
“One of the pictures I have is about a woman who's working in the customer service industry. It says on her tag, ‘I'm here to serve you’ because that's hospitality, that's our job. But sometimes you're harassed. Sometimes you get the short end of the stick, and it's not even your fault or what you're doing, you still have to smile. But inside, is that what you're feeling? You're kind of trapped with what you're supposed to be able to say or do.”
“For the shoes ones, women are constantly, in order to take and fit into a certain expectation set for them about body image or career path or what it means to be a woman, that they're constantly trying to fit into the shoes and then hurting themselves in order to fit into those shoes that we put in front of them. And I wanted to kind of highlight that in this specific project as well.”
Her pieces don’t all have a direct meaning. Liddicoat invites the viewer to see within themselves what pieces may mean to them, “ Sometimes [women] see [the picture] and there's totally different meanings based on their own experiences,” Liddicoat said.
Liddicoat’s fascination with film falls under the production side, “I always was drawn to films about the behind the scenes stuff, and I never realized why. I did take the one film class I had in high school available to me, and I really loved it. I realized this is just what I want to do. I want to be someone who creates the scripts, who takes the film itself and then gets to tell a story to [the] general public.”
Liddicoat is actively filming a documentary for an upcoming film showcase on Dec. 17.
Liddicoat’s plans for the near future consist of continuing film-making for the School of Television and Film showcases, such as the spring semester’s Magic Hour 2025. For her senior year, she will be working on her senior thesis film, which will be showcased at I Dream in Widescreen.
Kaitlyn Liddicoat’s Top Rated Letterboxd Films:
The Perks of Being a Wallflower - “It's one of my biggest inspirational films. I love the comedy in it. I love the coming-of-age story that it brings. I love the topics that it explores. I think it just blends together into this beautiful film.”
The Iron Giant - “Brad Bird knew what he was doing. He cooked on that film.”
Honorable Mention
Star Wars: A New Hope - “One of the first films I ever remember watching as a kid was A New Hope, and I think that probably did something to me because I'm a huge Star Wars fan [now]. I love how they portrayed a space drama like they did. I've carried that with me ever since.”
An interview between Liddicoat and KAMP News Director Topaz Servellon
Art featured in the November, Vol. I issue of Frequency!
Originally conducted: 11/18/2024
Author: Topaz Servellon
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