Willow Voges Fernandes – Between skate park and film set

Willow is a member of year 5 at Phorms Campus Hamburg. In January 2014 he played in the film “Wolfskinder” by director Rick Ostermann
PHOTO: MEEKE VOGES | 2014

Willow is 11 years old and a member of year 5 at Phorms Campus Hamburg. He has been going to school here since year 4. He likes the school and his classmates. His favourite subject is physical educa­tion. He would like to become a professional sportsman later in life. He trains hard on his skateboard to make this happen. When he was three years old, his father inspired him to take up the sport. Since then, he has spent as much time as possible on wheels. He has already entered several contests, winning second place on two occasions. To improve his coordination skills, he regularly trains on the trampoline. His other hobby, you might say, is acting. In January, the film Wolfskinder by director Rick Ostermann was screened at the Max Ophüls film festival. In this film, Willow plays a boy who travels aimlessly through former East Prussia towards Lithuania with a group of children after the end of World War II without their parents. Always on the lookout for Russians, the children have to endure many hardships. Willow sacrificed two weeks of his summer holidays to work on filming in Lithuania, six hours a day. But the effort was worthwhile. When Wolfskinder was shown at the Venice Film Festival in 2013, Willow was allowed to walk along the red carpet with the rest of the cast and crew. What is so nice about Willow is that he tells this story without a any vanity, almost as if it was nothing.


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