Let's take a trip across the ditch and check in on another Kiwi GASSie, for the first time in quite a while. This time we are speaking with 2023 New Filmmaker of the Year award recipient Harry Wynn. Back in the 2000's Harry was a secondary student in Auckland, who applied for and received the opportunity to join a group of Australasian exchange students on an adventure in Germany over the Christmas of 2009 / 10. These days he is making amazing films and receiving the recognition his talents deserve.
Year of exchange: 2009 / 10
Group Leader: Valerie Rozen
School: Lynfield College, Auckland
Sponsor: Michael and Helen Wiedemann
Town / city of exchange in Germany: Dinslaken, NRW
My exchange took place in a city called Dinslaken. It’s a small city I had never heard of in the Ruhrgebiet. It wasn’t far from the bigger cities of Nordrhein-Westfalen, like Düsseldorf and Cologne, but it gave me a glimpse into life in a fairly standard German city. At the school I attended, I made friends with a mix of locals and other exchange students, some of whom I still speak with every now and then. My host family didn’t speak much English, so I ended up leaving the exchange with a high level of German, which I am now very envious of my younger self for achieving.
I really enjoyed travelling independently, as well as with my host family. With my host family, we travelled to Hamburg and to Bavaria for snowboarding. I travelled independently to the very bottom of Baden-Württemberg to Lake Constance, as well as to Munich and Salzburg in Austria. Coming from a small island country at the bottom of the Pacific, it was always exciting to think that you could jump on a train and, in a few hours, be in a new place with a completely different culture.
Some of my favourite memories of the exchange were the Winter and Berlin camps. It was great to connect with others who were going through similar experiences, living with host families and fully immersing themselves in German life.
After leaving high school, I stayed in my hometown, Auckland, and studied at the University of Auckland. During my studies, I moved back to Germany and worked as an assistant teacher in Schleswig-Holstein, which was an incredible experience. At university in Aotearoa, I studied Political Science and German, and at the end of my studies, I worked at the German Trade Council, which was great as I was able to work in a bilingual office.
After graduating from university, I thought I’d work for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, but luckily, I found my calling – filmmaking. I moved to Wellington, the home of films like Avatar and The Lord of the Rings, and attended The New Zealand Film and Television School.
I live in Auckland, where I work as a producer and director, specialising in documentary filmmaking. Last year, I won the Producer Guild’s ‘New Filmmaker of the Year’ award, which recognises me as an emerging talent and innovator in filmmaking, which is super humbling. After years of building my skillset on multi-million-dollar documentary and factual TV productions, I am now developing and making the stories that I want to tell. Currently, I am writing and directing my first television series called ‘We’ve Always Been Here,’ about Aotearoa’s rainbow history and connecting it to current events from a uniquely millennial perspective. Other projects in development include feature films and TV shows, two of which are actually Australian stories.
I am extremely ambitious, so I am building my career to the stage where I can make the leap to the States to try my luck in an industry that moves much faster than it does in Aotearoa. Before then, I am working towards getting my first couple of feature films off the ground.
SAGSE/NZ German Student Exchange opened my eyes to a whole new world. I think living in a different culture offers so many benefits, like gaining confidence, understanding different viewpoints and a different way of living. I now work in a field where ‘world-building’ is something I think about every day, so immersing myself in a completely foreign place has had a long-lasting impact. I met so many wonderful people on this exchange that I still think about. I believe everyone should do an exchange like this when they’re a teenager.
I want to encourage anyone considering doing an exchange to take part. Exposing yourself to a different way of doing things, thinking, and education system not only opens up the participant’s eyes to a different way of life but also enriches the families and schools involved. I gained so much from being part of this program, and my life feels much richer for it. It has made me more adaptable and open to different ways of thinking.