- Welcome to POV .
I'm Pete Schwaba, host of PBS Wisconsin's Director's Cut .
I'm always fascinated as to how or where an artist finds a muse.
For indigenous painter Rember Yahuarcani,
it turned out to be his grandmother.
Tonight, we learn more about the special bond between these two
souls as we travel to Yahuarcani's world in the film
The Song of the Butterflies.
Rember is an accomplished Peruvian artist
who comes from a long line of artists.
He says that when he paints,
he listens to his grandmother's voice in his head.
And when he hears her, he knows his painting will be good.
His grandmother's voice also leads Rember from
his home in Lima
to his family's native land of the Uitoto nation
and finally to La Chorrera, Colombia
on the other side of the Andes Mountains.
It's during this cathartic journey
that Rember learns more about
the abuse of his people
at the hands of industrialists,
specifically those who built rubber plantations.
He also learns of the horrors that his grandmother endured;
horrors that his father, also a painter,
would often recreate on canvas.
The Song of the Butterflies
is director Núria Frigola Torrent's
feature-length directorial debut.
She considers it a gift that she found Rember
and is honored to be able to tell his story.
Torrent has always been fascinated
by origins and family roots.
In The Song of the Butterflies,
she uses experimental techniques
like incorporating natural sounds
and using black and white footage.
She also employs a voice-over artist
for the voice of Rember's grandmother, Martha...
ever present in his mind.
Rember Yahuarcani says when Martha passed away
she asked him to give her message to the world.
Tonight, with an assist from Nuria Frigola Torrent,
he does just that.
The Song of the Butterflies starts now on PBS Wisconsin,
your home for independent film.