Curators: Louis Massiah, Scribe Video Center and Patricia R. Zimmermann, Ithaca College; Archive Research from the XFR Collective
A national traveling exhibition, We Tell: 50 Years of Participatory Community Media chronicles the hidden histories of place-based documentaries that situate their collaborative practices in specific locales, communities, and needs for social and political change.
Participatory community media represents a unique form of short documentary practice produced with communities and the subjects engaged in decision-making and representation. These works embrace and enhance the micro rather than the macro as a production strategy. They shift discourse and debate from the national to the local. Instead of the long form theatrical feature, participatory community media utilizes the short form documentary circulating within and across communities and politics.
We Tell: 50 Years of Participatory Community Media is supported by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Ford Foundation Just Films
Program 1 – 6:30PM
Collaborative Knowledges
Various Directors, 1973-2011, 98 min.
Filmmaker DeeDee Halleck will be present
Collaborative Knowledges focuses on inter-generational dialogues as a way to reclaim history and knowledge in people rather than in institutions. This program features videos that unearth lost knowledge and histories; elaborate shared experiences; and document traditions and practices of storytelling.
Program 2 – 8:30 PM
Turf
Various Directors, 1979-2011, 90 min.
Filmmaker DeeDee Halleck will be present
The works in Turf dig out the complexities and politics of gentrification, homelessness, housing, and the significance of urban spaces for democratic participation. The videos in Turf reveal that cities have transformed into battlegrounds between communities and those in power who would take land and space to expand economic and political power.
