Ian Kerkhof

Ian Kerkhof (b. 1 January 1964, Johannesburg), known as Aryan Kaganof since 1999, is a South-African film director, screenwriter, novelist, and poet, sometimes humorously referred to as the inventor of "feelbad" movie genre. Ian studied politics and dramaturgy at the University of Durban from 1981 to '83, fleeing his homeland at nineteen to avoid the mandatory military draft. He acquired refugee status in the Netherlands by 1984, working as a foreign reporter for several publications from Poland, Italy, Britain and South Africa. In 1994, he graduated from the Netherlands Film and Television Academy (NFTVA). Kerkhof's '92 feature-length directorial debut, Kyodai Makes the Big Time drama, won the "Golden Calf for Best Feature Film" award at Netherlands Film Festival. He also directed Naar de Klote! in 1996, the first film to depict an uprising Dutch gabber scene. Ian Kerkhof worked on a few projects in Japan, including his '98 Beyond Ultra Violence: Uneasy Listening By Merzbow documentary co-produced with Merzbow and critically-acclaimed Shabondama Elegy with Otomo Yoshihide's music, based on Jack Henry Abbott's and Tricia Warden's writings, which received NFF's "Golden Calf Special Jury Prize" in 1999.