This is a film about Amsterdam, and the most interesting and inspiring people that make Amsterdam the city it is.
Otto Nan is the most interesting person of the gallerist Willem Baars.
Otto took a beautiful old building, with an extraordinary history. It’s been a prison, it’s been a squat and now it’s this amazing hotel.
In Otto Nan’s own words:
My name is Otto Nan. I’m managing director of the Lloyd Hotel and Cultural Embassy in Amsterdam.
It’s the place where we are now and I think people best know me for being an intrapreneur with a cultural interest.
Culture is in our veins and that’s what we try to show here.We mix the commercial with the cultural in a beautiful place.
We try to show what we like about culture and also the hotel is it’s own studio. From here we can set new things in motion. For the adventures in our head this is our new place.
It was a building that was not used anymore, in the eastern Docklands.
There has been a lot of redevelopment here around us and therefore the city government was looking for somebody who could do something beautiful here. Something that would differ from the monotonic approach of the other developments .
If there was one book the whole world should read, which would it be?
It would be the, ‘The Life Of Pi’ written by Yann Martel.
It’s about a man who is in the shipwreckand then
he’s floating for days, weeks, years and in the end I think it’s beautiful
because in the end you think maybe it’s just one trip and also it’s
sort of metaphor for living and floating you you can do a bit, but much of your life experience is out of your hands.
I think it’s like a beautiful fairy tale. A sort of adventure but also a sort of mind fuck.
I guess there are many parallels with the hotel. But I think the whole life is a big adventure.
If there was one piece of music the whole world should listen to, which one would it be?
It would be The Sinner, the Depeche Mode songBut then the remix by Ricardo Villalobos..
Originally it’s a very gloomy song. And Ricardo Villalobos turns it into a beautiful piece, cheerful but still serious.
In his hands it becomes very light and it’s very uplifting.
He introduces the opposite of the song’s original intention, yeah and it’s beautiful.
who is the most interesting person you know and why?
That’s Kostijn Egberts.
He is the owner of a record label
And he’s also manager of the most interesting band in Holland called Le Le and De Jeugd van Tegenworodig
They really juggle with language and hip-hop and it’s very yeah very interesting
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