PANSY BOY
Gavin Vitale’s 2024-25 Senior Thesis Project
PROGRESS SHOTS
ARTIST STATEMENT
I once heard someone say that it’s better to have too many emotions than too little, lest life be incredibly dull.
I’m not sure if I agree.
PANSY BOY is a film in which the viewer is led through my life, focusing on my emotional development over the years. I’ve always been someone who feels things incredibly deeply, which brought challenges in how I perceived life. I was sentimental about everything, and so documented life through my journals and a camera, hopeful to catch the memories in my hands and prevent them from slipping away.
As I filmed more, I fell in love with seeing life through the viewfinder, and recognized that my emotions fueled my videography. What started as an attempt to cling to life, became a process of appreciating it more. But I’d forgotten the natural volatility of emotions. With maturing, I began facing bouts of extreme anxiety and depression, the likes I’d never seen before.
This film serves to share my process of reconciling with my emotions, and the journey of accepting their strengths, as well as the roadblocks they provide.
THE ARTIST
Gavin Vitale is a videographer who specializes in narrative documentary videography, fascinated with capturing the world around him in impactful, emotional stories. Having grown up in Pennsylvania before taking an interest in the University of Connecticut’s Digital Media and Design major, he is now working towards completing his Bachelor of Fine Arts within their Film and Video department.
From a young age, Gavin was always more of an emotional child, seeing that quality as a weakness for much of his life. But upon viewing directors, cinematographers, and other storytellers utilizing their strong emotions to create works of art, his opinions on his emotionality began to change. He started creating work that delved into these topics, beginning with smaller projects but eventually taking on increasingly challenging films.
Today, Gavin’s work surrounds the bonds that tie us together as human beings, and the emotions with which we relate to one another, having made multiple award-winning films on these topics. As he plans for life after university, he aims to tell human stories at a larger scale, increasing the scope of people he can impact through the medium of film.