z e r a h a
RESOURCES FOR CREATIVE CHANGEArchive for Film
Arts Engine, Inc.
“Arts Engine, Inc. supports, produces, and distributes independent media of consequence and promotes the use of independent media by advocates, educators and the general public….
In 2000, during the height of the internet boom, (Katy) Chevigny and (Julia) Pimsleur were among the first to realize that social issue filmmaking was taking a dramatic turn. A new culture was emerging that would entirely change the face of media from televised monologues to internet-driven dialogues. And electronically facilitated dialogue and distribution channels opened opportunities to build online communities where no community existed before.
Committed to breaking down traditional hierarchies and status-markers, Arts Engine launched one of the only online commons for filmmakers and activists, called MediaRights.org, and created what is now the most comprehensive database of social issue documentaries in the nation, and possibly the world, with over 6,000 films registered. The success of this site led to the creation of the Youth Media Distribution Initiative (YMDi.org). They also developed and launched the Media That Matters Film Festival, one of the first online film festivals, and realized the incredible potential for online showcasing and distribution. Now in its seventh year, the festival reaches hundreds of thousands of people annually and hosts hundreds of internet pages of information with “Take Action Links” on everything from AIDS in Africa, to water rights in Michigan, to the youth vote, LGBT issues, and sustainability. The ballast for this intense activism from the early beginnings in 1997 to today is the belief that exemplary visual storytelling on social issues can make change.”
Visit Arts Engine at http://artsengine.net/index.php.
The Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media
Founded by award-winning actress Geena Davis, The Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media (GDIGM)
“works with entertainment creators and companies, educates the next generation of content-creators, and informs the public about the need to increase the number of girls and women in media aimed at kids and to reduce stereotyping of both males and females.”
Their programs include media research, public education, advocacy campaigns such as “I Want to See Jane,” and an annual conference event. Visit their site to learn more.
The Euphoria Project
The Euphoria Project is self-described as “science-based, self-help, art-film.” This Csíkszentmihályi takes on the streets, positive psychology documentary arts-periment with a mission streams online here, releasing new episodes every week.
Institute for Photographic Empowerment
The Institute of Photographic Empowerment (IPE). Sounds like what it is! The organization’s mission, per their website is:
“to support the study and practice of participant–produced documentary projects in photography, film, and digital media.
The Institute is a resource for people from around the globe—photographers, filmmakers, academics, researchers, and project participants—to share ideas, learn from one another, and develop the field.
The first such Institute of its kind in the world, IPE supports a virtual center on the web, annual conferences, and academic learning and research related to participant–produced photography and film. Additionally, it provides new opportunities for the traditionally disenfranchised to use their own images to communicate directly with policymakers about the social issues that profoundly affect their lives: HIV/AIDS, poverty, environmental degradation.
A unique university–community partnership, the Institute was jointly created by the renowned USC Annenberg School for Communication and Venice Arts, a prominent nonprofit leader in the field, in recognition of the growing international interest in photographic empowerment, particularly as a component in movements for social change.”
Visit IPE soon here.
Wide Angle Youth Media
Wide Angle Youth Media is a Baltimore-based organization that has been building young people through media skills since 2000. Per their website website, the organization ”provides Baltimore youth with opportunities to tell their stories using video technology, critical thinking, and public speaking skills. Our video workshops, public screenings of student work, and youth-run television programs aim to make media make a difference. “
“Glaneurs et la glaneuse, Les” / “The Gleaners and I”
The Internet Movie Databases’s (IMDB) plot summary describes the film written and directed by Agnès Varda as:
“An intimate, picaresque inquiry into French life as lived by the country’s poor and its provident, as well as by the film’s own director, Agnès Varda. The aesthetic, political and moral point of departure for Varda are gleaners, those individuals who pick at already-reaped fields for the odd potato, the leftover turnip.”
Click here to see IMDB’s full profile on the film.
