Kia Ora beautiful people, I am Zoran - a NZ Film Director - the visionary and the driving force behind the multidisciplinary VOX365NZ project. After spending the past 6 months around the world, campaigning and organising for the International part of VOX365 and being “lost” for five years on the Gold Coast between 2017 and 2022 (feeling semi-retired and utterly uninspired creatively) I’m back in our most beautiful and vibrant Aotearoa.

I started VOX365NZ almost 10 years ago - actually the project idea began developing back in 2012, at that time I was between Hong Kong and Auckland until October 2013, when I decided to move back to our magnificent Aotearoa permanently. The filming of the first 12 interviews happened in only ONE day, at my studio in Victoria Park Market in 2014. The project and the idea continued developing over the course of the following couple of years. I couldn’t have done it if I didn’t have the generous support of a fantastic group of dedicated and passionate people (true international Kiwis) - all highly trained professionals in their own field and my dear friends. Their names in no particular order: Producers: Square & Sums (Oriza Foundation); Producer: Mr. Grae Burton (now Manager at the Lake House Arts Centre); Executive Producer: Wallace Media; Graphics: Lucie Blaževska; Sound Engineer: Mike Hoyle Gutiérrez; Motion Graphics: Nicolas Plaire; DOP, Camera and post-production: Geraldine Clermont; Associate Producer: Alex Plumb; Co-Producer: Foundation North; Production Coordinator: Beatrice Lo; Assistant Director I: Chiara Bottura; Assistant Director II: Erinc Yikar; Sound Designer: “DJ Frozen Heat”; Photography: Peter Jennings; Photography: Dennis Thorpe; Sound Engineer: Lawrence Brock; Social Research on the Project: Prof. Ralph Bathurst and his team at Massey Business School (CORG) and not to forget all the beautiful, original music by so many talented musicians from Aotearoa: Caitlin Smith, J. Adam Colegrove, Strangely Arousing, Chewy Willson, The Neo-Kalshnikovs, Paul Williams, Otis Mace and Miho’s Jazz Orchestra, to mention but a few.

As I said above, we did the filming of the interviews with 12 different acts in one single day - some bands such as the highly talented Strangely Arousing and Miho’s Jazz Orchestra had five or six band members present. My studio "The Cave" buzzed with excitement - artists everywhere - there were about 60 people going in and out of the studio in those 8 hours. We were on fire baby! Fine-tuned and synchronised like a Swiss watch - no, not really lol... organising artists is more like herding cats... but nonetheless, it was the most inspiring and beautiful day of my life. The post-production took a bit longer (a couple of months), since my editor was engaged on various high-paid projects. What can I say...this project is indeed a labour of love, not only for myself as the initiator of the whole idea, but I can voice that on behalf of my past and present team of collaborators and creatives - dear friends. This time around, I'm hoping to do things "right" (whatever that means) and get the funding sorted before I start filming the Pilot for VOX365NZ "Voices of Aotearoa" which involves interviews with 10 unique and prominent artists from our beautiful Aotearoa. And this is just the beginning... the journey continues in the following 12 to 18 months filming all 365 artists inhabiting this mesmerizing jewel - at the edge of the world - proudly called Aotearoa. Thank you for your time and kind support.