Patrik Thomas is an artist and filmmaker based in Munich and Lisbon. His practice operates at the intersection of documentary film, expanded cinema, media pedagogy, and spatial installation. He works with collective and process-based formats, often deliberately blurring the boundaries between documentary and fiction in order to examine how images circulate, how publics are formed, and how cinema can function as a social and political practice in public space.
His work is shaped by long-term collaborations and self-organized infrastructures. In 2013, he co-founded the collaborative film laboratory and residency format MOVIMENTO in Portugal, conceived as an interdisciplinary and intergenerational space for collective filmmaking, action-based learning, and reflected practice. MOVIMENTO became a key site for developing his methodological approach to applied film pedagogy, shared authorship, and non-hierarchical knowledge production, which continues to inform his later projects.
A central reference for his recent work is BOALÂNDIA, his feature documentary on Brazilian cineclub movements and cultural resistance, which premiered at the São Paulo International Film Festival. The project examines cinema as a tool for self-organization, counter-archiving, and the active occupation of public space, and has strongly influenced Thomas’s subsequent focus on mobile and site-specific cinema infrastructures.
Since 2023, his practice has increasingly shifted toward mobile and urban formats. With CINÉ VÉLO CITÉ, a bicycle-powered mobile cinema and film laboratory developed within the EU-funded program Creating NEBourhoods Together, he has realized more than 70 screenings and workshops in and around Munich, with guest appearances in Brussels and Leipzig. The project has collaborated with festivals, schools, and cultural institutions and has served as a mobile venue and film lab for DOK.fest Munich and the SPIELART Festival.
In parallel, he is developing CINEVAN, a van-based mobile cinema and production platform commissioned by Lothringer 13 Halle and realized in collaboration with the Goethe-Institut and the Museum Brandhorst. CINEVAN functions as a hybrid of exhibition space, workshop, and roaming archive, activating historically and politically charged sites in Munich and, in later chapters, across (South-)Eastern Europe.
Teaching and artistic research are integral to Thomas’s practice. He has held teaching assignments and workshops at art academies, theaters, and universities, including a long-term teaching collaboration at Hochschule München with Prof. Andrea Benze. His pedagogical work focuses on film as a collective tool for spatial research, participation, and critical image literacy, working with children, youth, and adults in schools, theaters, and public institutions.
His films and installations have been shown internationally in festivals, museums, and exhibitions. His hybrid short film TAIWASTE received the FFF Förderpreis, and he has been awarded, among others, the Leonhard & Ida Wolf Art Award (Munich), the French-German Art Prize CONTEMPORARY, and the Video Art Award of the City of Bremen.
He is currently developing ANGRA, a new film project on nuclear infrastructure, memory politics, and resistance in Brazil, continuing his long-term research into cinema as a tool of collective perception, negotiation, and remembrance.
FILMOGRAPHY (SELECTION)
2024 – BOALÂNDIA Feature-documentary film about cultural resistance in Brazil, FFF Bayern Doc-Debut / BKM Bundeskulturministerium, with Mathias R. Zausinger, Edgar-Reitz-Filmproduktion, Brazil / Germany
2020 – TAIWASTE: 25min, Taiwan, fictional documentary / experimental documentary
2018 – KRÄFTE AM SET: DIARIES OF DEBORAH RANZINI: 20min, Portugal / Germany, doc-fiction, in collaboration with Mathias R. Zausinger, K.Liebfried
2016 – HOTEL DESTERRO: 2x 45min, Portugal / Mauritania / Senegal / Guinea-Bissau, doc-fiction, in collaboration with Sebastião Braga
2015 – CARTE BLANCHE: 25min, Bulgaria / Germany, doc-fiction, media installation, in collaboration with Mathias R. Zausinger, Kalas Liebfried
EXHIBITIONS & SCREENINGS (SELECTION)
2026 – LOTHRINGER13 HALLE: Antifascism. Now.: CINEVAN
2025 – KAMMERSPIELE MÜNCHEN: Zeit ohne Gefühle
2025 – HALLE12, Spinnerei Leipzig: GMS Stipendium, Cusanus: CinéVéloCité
2025 – INTERNATIONAL URANIUM FILM FESTIVAL: TAIWASTE, Best Shortfilm Award
2025 – Dok.FEST Munich: Bavarian Premiere “BOALÂNDIA“
2025 – LICHTER Filmfest Frankfurt: German Premiere “BOALÂNDIA“
2024 – Goethe Institute São Paulo: BOALÂNDIA Networking week
2024 – SPIFF48: International Film Festival São Paulo, World Premiere “BOALÂNDIA“
2024 – TECHNESPHERE Leipzig, M24_Festival
2024 – ANDERART Munich, “TAIWASTE”
2024 – UTOPIA – Kulturbunt Neuperlach, “TAIWASTE”
2023 – EMAF – European Media Art Festival 26 – Osnabrück, “TAIWASTE”
2023 – HESSISCHE KULTURSTIFTUNG, Kunsthaus Wiesbaden, “The tide is high”, TAIWASTE”
2022 – GALERIE DER KÜNSTLER “Mind Body Matters”, collaborative performance project with “WORKERS” collective
2022 – MOVIMENTO 22, Angra do Heroísmo, Açores Islands, Portugal
2021 – REFERAT FÜR ARBEIT & WIRTSCHAFT “WORKERS”, documentary media installation, performance, with PLATFORM München
2020 – STAATSTHEATER NÜRNBERG ”Erste Staffel”, webseries in collaboration with Boris Nikitin, Bayerischer Rundfunk
2020 – KURZFILMWOCHE REGENSBURG “TAIWASTE”, world-premiere, running in German & environmental competition, FFF Award
2020 – FESTIVAL DES DEUTSCHEN KINOS ”FILMZ”, TAIWASTE running in the category Deutscher Dokumentarfilm, Mainz, Germany
2020 – TMFW6 Filmweek, “TAIWASTE”, Asian Premiere at the , Bali, Indonesia / Eco Film Festival, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
2018 – PUBLIC ART MUNICH 2018 “Kräfte am Set, Kraft des Kinos”, collab. with Alexander Kluge’s Winter of Love, curated by Joanna Warsza, comissioned by PAM 2018, in collaboration with Kalas Liebfried, Mathias R. Zausinger
2017 – VISIO 2017: LO SCHERMO DELL’ARTE “Directing the Real: Artists’ Films and Video in the 2010s“, HOTEL DESTERRO, curated by Leonardo Bigazzi, Palazzo Medici, Florence, Italy
AWARDS, RESIDENCIES & STIPENDS (SELECTION)
2022 – STIPENDIUM BILDENDE KUNST, Stadt München / Kulturreferat
2021 – HESSISCHE KULTURSTIFTUNG, Reisestipendium
2022 – SUMMERSCHOOL UCP PORTO “Cross Dynamics of Otherness, with João Salaviza, Renée Nader Messora, Ana Vaz, Kaê Guajajara, Kleber Mendonça Filho, Susana de Sousa Dias
2021 – SUMMERSCHOOL UCP PORTO “Survivance: Escolda de resistência”, with Filipa Cesár, HKW Berlin
2021 – VILLA WALDBERTA, collaborative residency with the portuguese Filmmaker Filipe Carvalho
2018 – TAIPEI Artist Residency, Taipei Artist Village, Apartmenthaus der Kunst, GOETHE Institut, Kulturreferat, Munich, Germany
2018 – GAK – Gesellschaft für Aktuelle Kunst “Videokunst Förderpreis der Stadt Bremen”, WORKERS4, Filmbüro Bremen / Stadt Bremen, curated by: Sarah Kaiser
EDUCATIONAL WORKS (SELECTION)
2026 – HOCHSCHULE MÜNCHEN: Schlüsselkompetenz Master, Fak Architektur & Theorie der Stadt
2025 – SPIELART Festival: CinéVéloCité
2023 – CINEVELOCITE / KINO FAHRRAD STADT, Hochschule München: Fakultät für Architektur & Städteplanung (Prof. Andrea Benze) in Zusammenarbeit mit den Münchner Kammerspielen (Elke Bauer)
2023 – GILGAMESH, Bellevue di Monaco, theatre & film workshops, in collaboration with Christine Umpfenbach and Denijen Paulevic
2022 – RAUMFRAGEN NEUPERLACH, film workshops with kids & teenagers in Neuperlach, in collaboration with Raphael Krome and Adrian Sölsch
2022 – EAST SIDE STORIES, video stage design, media education, Münchner Kammerspiele
2022 – THEATERCHECKER*INNEN, film & theatre education, Münchner Kammerspiele, Schauburg Theater
2022 – YOUNG PATHOS COLLECTIVE, film & media education, in collaboration with Chris Hohenester
2020 – DER FAHRENDE RAUM, media educatio for kids, Super8 8mm film Workshop, incollaboration with Felicitas Sonvilla, Leo Heinik and Ludwig Bader
2018 – MACAU IMAGE&SOUND WORKSHOP, media education in collaboration with Filipe Carvalho
2011 – 2019 -Several film pedagogic workshops & laboratories in Portugal, Mocambique, Macau, Brazil, Taiwan and Mali
COMMISSIONED WORKS (SELECTION)
2022 – TANZTENDENZ / HALLE6, “Is a planet an enormous mountain?” by Stephanie Felber, 360° film concept in collaboration with Stephanie Felber, 360° camera & editing, media handling & 360° installation
2022 – SCHWERE REITER, “Is there a world beyond the image?” by Stephanie Felber, live video & media installation, stage design
2022 – HAUS DER KUNST, Fujiko Nakaya retrospective, video / media restoration, media handling, versioning, for Haus der Kunst
2021 – GOETHE INSTITUT BERLIN, webseries about literature, with Hopscotch Reading room Berlin, in collaboration with Kalas Liebfried
2021 – KUNSTCLUB13, portrait videos, editing, media handling
2021 – GOETHE INSTITUT SHANGHAI, Christine Umpfenbach retrospective, editing & media handling
2021 – SCHWERE REITER, opening event of the new building, video installation, live camera, live-regie
2021 – HAUS DER KUNST, “MARX” by Olaf Nicolai, 24h film editing & media handling / versioning for synchronous live screening in 14 other institutions worldwide
2021 – KUNSTVEREIN DRESDEN, “I keep having these dreams” by Beto Shwafaty, media installation & handling
2021 – METROPOLREGION MÜNCHEN, documentation & editing, Europäische Metropolregion München e.V.
2019 – MATHILDENHÖHE DARMSTADT, Retrospective by Olaf Nicolai, media installation & handling
2018 – MÜNCHNER BIENALE, Festival für neues Musiktheater, “liminal space”, video stage design for Jakob Stillmark