Do you know of an Anti-Racist or Anti-Colonial event going on that should be included here? Let us know!
Haile Gerima Talk “Orphaning Africans: Displacement Set in Motion” March 19, 2021 1-3pmEST
Join the talk here. Haile Gerima is an acclaimed Ethiopian filmmaker and academic on Africa and the African diasporas and a founding member of the L.A. Rebellion that formed around the UCLA Film School in the 60s and 70s. Serving as an interlocutor is York University Professor and Head of Founders College Pablo Idahosa, who is poised to stimulate a constructive and enlightening conversation with Gerima on a range of issues, from the place of Africa in the world to the construction of Blackness.
Gerima is an independent filmmaker and a professor of film at Howard University in Washington, D.C. Aptly named Mypheduh 'sacred shield of culture' by his dramatist and playwright father, in the 50 years that Gerima has been making films, his films have been noted for their exploration of the issues and history pertinent to members of the African diaspora and celebrated for their corrective Hollywood versions of slave narrative. His work contends with the African continent itself to the Americas and Western Hemisphere and critically comments on the physical, cultural and psychological dislocation of Black peoples during and after slavery. In particular his films distinguish themselves from other sanitized and more commercially oriented films because he privileges the narratives and perspectives of Africans and members of the African diaspora. Some of his works include: Bush Mama (1979), Harvest: 3000 years (1975), Ashes & Embers (1982), Sankofa (1993), Adwa (1999), and Teza (2008). Throughout his career, Gerima’s films have been recognized with numerous awards and distinctions from film festivals around the world, including: the Grand Prix Award from the Lisbon International Film Festival and FIPRESCI Film Critics Award from the Berlin International Film Festival for his film Ashes & Embers; the grand prize at the African Cinema Festival in Italy and Best Cinematography Award at the FESPACO Pan-African Film Festival in Burkina Faso for Sankofa; and the Special Jury Prize and Best Screen Play Award from the Venice International Film Festival for his most recent film, Teza.
Presented by York University LAPS African Studies Program
Dionne Brand 'What we saw. What we made. When we emerge.' Kitty Lundy Memorial Lecture March 11, 2021 6pm
Register here This year’s Kitty Lundy Memorial Lecture will be given by award-winning author Dionne Brand. Dr. Brand is a renowned poet, novelist, and essayist known for formal experimentation and the beauty and urgency of her work.
A poet engagé, Dr. Brand’s award-winning poetry books include Land to Light On (the Governor General’s Literary Award and Trillium Book Award); thirsty (The Pat Lowther Award); Ossuaries (the prestigious Griffin Poetry Prize). Her latest, The Blue Clerk, an essay poem, won the Trillium Book Award. Theory, her latest of five novels, won the Toronto Book Award. She is the author of the influential non-fiction work, A Map to the Door of No Return. Her most recent non-fiction work is An Autobiography of the Autobiography of Reading. Brand is a Professor in the School of English and Theatre Studies at the University of Guelph.
Meagan Byrne is an Âpihtawikosisân (Métis, Ontario) game designer born and raised in Hamilton, Ontario. Her designs incorporate narrative, game mechanics, sound and traditional art and are deeply rooted in Indigenous Futurisms, language and Indigenous feminist theory. She sees her work as a constant struggle to navigate the complexities of Indigenous identity within a deeply colonized system. Meagan uses her games to explore questions of cultural belonging, the Indigenization of media and the future of Indigenous language and culture. Meagan received a B.A. of English Literature (2009) from McMaster University and a B.A. of Game Design (2017) from The Sheridan College Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning. Meagan was the first Digital + Interactive Coordinator at the imagineNATIVE Media Festival and is the current owner/lead designer of Achimostawinan Games, an Indigenous-run and staffed indie game studio.
Maya Chacaby aka Odehamik, is Anishinaabe (Ojibwe) Autochtone from the Kaministiqua region. Her family comes from Red Rock First Nation. Chacaby, an Assistant Professor in the Sociology Department at Glendon College, is an Anishinaabe survivance philosopher and brings from her traditional territory a bundle of magical metaphor coins, a tough cloak of irony, heaps of her favourite food (Anishinaabe metaphysical conjecture), an instant pop-up escape from oblivion hatch, a pair of sweet shades against victimry and a high-quality set of nihilist cancelling head phones. She is best known as a confluence of transmogrificating phantasmagoricals often seen in awkward social situations gnawing on a pile of juicy etymologies (her second favourite food).Chacaby is a mare’s nest of impossibilities with at least 20 extra autistic senses (synesthesia, alexithymia, stims, apraxia, non-interoceptive, non-proprioseptive, hyperlexia, atelophobia, dyspraxia, palilelia, echolalia, dyscalculia, munus exsecutivam, non-24 circadian rhythm, prosopagnosia, misophonia, non-object permanence, rejection sensitive, hyperacuisis, verbal/non-verbal); a proficient speaker of her language, Anishinaabemowin; a traditional ceremonial person; two-spirited, anti-colonial writer; a human-trafficking surviver; a former street kid; dyslexic; socially anxious; provincial policy analyst; researcher; community consultant on trauma; government consultant on boring technical tables; and (most importantly) a pro-gamer. Altogether, Indigenous and autistic, raised to be a “surrealistic oppositional creature of obvious liminality.”
Joined by Yifat Shaik-Art Director, Game Design and Illustrator, Assistant Professor in Computational Arts at York University
Presented by York University Department of Cinema and Media Arts
In Conversation with Wayne Wapeemukwa Writer/Director of Luk'Luk'I, Winner of 2019 Best Canadian First Feature, TIFF March 3, 2021
Luk'Luk'I (pronounced "lucklucky") is the acclaimed and devastating feature directorial debut of Wayne Wapeemukwa, made with Telefilm's Talent to Watch program (in partnership with York). Set in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver during the 2010 Winter Olympics, the film centres on five residents of the poverty-stricken neighbourhood, with a cast that includes Angel Gates, Joe Buffalo, Ken Harrower, Eric Buurman and Angela Dawson. The actors participated directly in writing the screenplay, using their own real-life experiences – including Harrower's experience as a gay man with a disability and Dawson's experience as local underground culture figure "Rollergirl" – to inform and create their characters' storylines. The film's title refers to the Coast Salish name for the Downtown Eastside.
York University Department of Cinema and Media Arts
Skawennati Talk March 1, 2021
Recording of talk available here (sign in through Yorku)
Skawennati makes art that addresses history, the future, and change from her perspective as an urban Kanien’kehá:ka (Mohawk) woman and as a cyberpunk avatar. She is Co-Director of the Aboriginal Territories in Cyberspace at Concordia University in Montreal.
Her works have been presented in Europe, Oceania, China and across North America in exhibitions such as “Uchronia I What if?”, in the HyperPavilion at the 57th Venice Biennale; “Now? Now!” at the Biennale of the Americas; and “Looking Forward (L’Avenir)” at the Montreal Biennale. They are included in the collections of the National Gallery of Canada and the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal, among others.
Moderated by Niki Little, Artistic Director, imagineNATIVE
Co-presented by York University Department of Cinema and Media Arts, Sensorium, imagineNATIVE and V-Tape. Skawennati’s talk is part of the Regeneration: All Our Relations series organized through Sensorium: The Centre for Digital Art and Technology and is supported by the Indigeneity in Teaching and Learning Fund at York University.
Black Lives and Archival Histories in Canada Archive/Counter-Archive Annual Symposium December 10 and 11, 2020
This year's panels and keynotes will focus on injurious archives, artistic engagements with race in archives, and place-based/institutional engagements with Black and intersectional histories.
Keynote: Deanna Bowen, "Berlin, Berlin"
Speakers: Janie Cooper-Wilson, Melissa Nelson, Andrea Fatona, Debbie Ebanks Schlums, Nadine Valcin , Cara Mumford
Indigenous Women’s Cinema in Canada Panel with Lisa Jackson, Tasha Hubbard and Amanda Strong November 24, 2020
Recording of panel featuring 3 visionary artists available here (sign in through Yorku)
Lisa Jackson is an award-winning creator of documentary and fiction films, virtual reality and multimedia installation works. Her films have screened at SXSW, Berlinale, Hotdocs, Tribeca, BFI London, Melbourne Museum and the Art Gallery of Ontario, and are broadcasted widely. Her short LICHEN screened at Sundance in 2020 and Indictment: The Crimes Of Shelly Chartier is one of the top watched documentaries on CBC, won the 2017 imagineNATIVE Best Doc award. In 2018, her Webby-nominated VR Biidaaban: First Light premiered at Tribeca Storyscapes, and won a Canadian Screen Award.
Dr. Tasha Hubbard is a filmmaker and an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Native Studies at the University of Alberta. She is from Peepeekisis First Nation and is the mother of a thirteen-year-old son. Two Worlds Colliding, about Saskatoon’s infamous Starlight Tours, won the Canada Award at the Gemini Awards in 2005. In 2016, she directed Birth of a Family. Her latest film, nîpawistamâsowin: We Will Stand Up, opened Hot Docs Canadian International Film Festival and won the top Canadian film prize and the Canadian Screen Award for Best Feature Documentary.
Amanda Strong is a Michif (Metis) interdisciplinary artist with a focus on filmmaking, stop motion animations and media art based on unceded Coast Salish territories. With a cross-discipline focus, common themes of her work are reclamation of Indigenous histories, lineage, language and culture. Strong is the Owner/Director/Producer of Spotted Fawn Productions Inc. (SFP). Her films have screened across the globe, most notably at Cannes, TIFF, VIFF, and Ottawa International Animation Festival (Biidaaban The Dawn Comes; Four Faces of the Moon; Flood) She has received grants Arts Councils and the NFB.
Moderated by Jamie Whitecrow (That Old Game Lacrosse)
Co-presented by imagineNATIVE and York University Department of Cinema and Media Arts
Art and Politics of Black Cinema in Canada Panel with Alison Duke, Charles Officer, Jennifer Holness, Sudz Sutherland November 3, 2020
Recording of panel discussion featuring four of Canada’s most dynamic producer/director/activist filmmakers available here.
Alison Duke Co-founder of Oya Media Group, Alison produced and co-wrote Mr. Jane and Finch, a CBC POV Documentary and also directed Cool Black North, a two-hour TV documentary for City TV. Current activities see her producing Laurie Townshend's feature documentary, Mothering in the Movement, kickstarting year 2 of Black Youth! Pathway2Industry, a 3-year initiative to support Black youth access to essential training, mentors, networks, and film industry spaces and developing her feature documentary Bam Bam: The Story of Sister Nancy. She recently finished post-production on, Promise Me, a dramatic short. Alison also won the 2019 WIFT Crystal Award for Mentorship for her mentorship of young filmmakers and for work with Pathways 2 Industry. Jennifer Holness Jennifer attended York where she studied political science and met "Sudz" Sutherland, kickstarting their extraordinary collaboration. Jennifer is the producer of the recent film Stateless by Michelle Stephenson which premiered at Hot Docs and won the Special Jury Prize – Canadian Feature Documentary. She directed the documentary film Speakers for the Dead. Jennifer’s production and writing credits include the feature film Love, Sex and Eating the Bones. She has also written for the television including the series Guns, She’s the Mayor and Shoot the Messenger. Sudz Sutherland Sudz is an alumni of the BFA in Film Production at York and has since developed an illustrious career as a film director and screenwriter. Credits include the films Doomstown, Love, Sex and Eating the Bones, Guns, Speakers for the Dead and Home Again, as well as episodes of Drop the Beat, Da Kink in My Hair, Degrassi: The Next Generation, Wild Roses, Jozi-H, Reign, She's the Mayor, Designated Survivor, Shoot the Messenger, Murdoch Mysteries, Frankie Drake Mysteries and Batwoman. He and Jennifer Holness co-produced Shoot the Messenger, for CBC and Sudz directed several episodes. Charles Officer Charles was a professional hockey player before working as a graphic designer and creative director. He is a triple threat: acting, directing, writing and has appeared in multiple film, television and stage productions. Officer’s short films When Morning Comes and Short Hymn_Silent War premiered at Toronto International Film Festival to wide acclaim. In 2005, Charles helmed the video Strugglin’ by international recording giant K’Naan. He developed and directed the television pilot Hotel Babylon, then followed up with a short documentary commissioned by Canadian reggae, punk band Bedouin Soundclash entitled, In The Year of Our Lord. He has directed episodes of series television including Da Kink In My Hair for Global Television. His first feature Nurse.Fighter.Boy was theatrically released in 2009 andgarnered 10 Genie nominations. His feature documentary Mighty Jerome: The Greatest Comeback inTrack & Field History was produced by the NFB. Unarmed Verses, a feature documentary was released in 2016 and won Best Canadian Documentary at Hot Docs. He recently premiered a new feature film at a drive-in at TIFF: Akilla’s Escape. Moderated by Esery Mondesir. Esery is a Toronto-based artist-filmmaker who was born in Port-au-Prince, Haïti. He worked as a high school teacher, a book designer and a labour organizer prior to receiving an MFA in cinema production from York University (Toronto) in 2017. His work, which includes documentary, fiction and experimental narratives, takes a critical stance on modern-day social, political and cultural phenomena to suggest a reading of our society from its margins. In 2016, he received the Lawrence Heisey Graduate Award in Fine Arts and, in 2017, he received the Paavo and Aino Lukkari Human Rights Award. His short film, Dangerous Weapons, was among the ten finalists at the 2016 TVO Short Doc Contest.
Presented by York University Department of Cinema and Media Arts
Alison Duke, Shant Joshi, Gillian Muller on Producing in Canada Oct 27, 2020
Recording of panel discussion on BIPOC Producers available here: Co-founder of Oya Media Group, Alison Duke aka “Golde” is a storyteller, in every sense of the word. Duke is known for telling dynamic stories that illuminate history, document the present, and push the culture forward. In 2019, Duke produced and co-wrote 'Mr. Jane and Finch', a CBC POV Documentary and CSA nominated film (Best Writing in a Documentary, Donald Brittain Award for Best Social/Political Film), and also directed 'Cool Black North', a two-hour TV documentary for City TV. Current activities see her producing Laurie Townshend's feature documentary, Mothering in the Movement, kickstarting year 2 of Black Youth! Pathway2Industry, a 3-year initiative to support Black youth access to essential training, mentors, networks, and film industry spaces and developing her feature documentary 'Bam Bam: The Story of Sister Nancy'. She recently finished post-production on, 'Promise Me', a dramatic short inspired by her 'The Woman I Have Become' (‘08). Alison also won the 2019 WIFT Crystal Award for Mentorship for her mentorship of young filmmakers and for work with Pathways 2 Industry.
Shant Joshi is a queer Indo-Canadian producer based in Los Angeles and Toronto. His credits include the films Porcupine Lake (TIFF, Busan, Rome, Outfest), Last Car (dir. John Greyson) and Pink: Diss (CBC); hit webseries Teenagers and I’m Fine (Dekkoo original series); and more than 15 short films, which have travelled the global festival circuit. Joshi co-founded the Future of Film Showcase as a launchpad for emerging Canadian filmmakers, and he previously worked at Buchwald and Madhouse Entertainment.
Gillian Müller attended Ryerson’s Film Studies Program, Vancouver Film School's Writing for Film and Television, and Second City's Sketch Writing and Improv program. She spent the better part of a decade as an Assistant Director with the DGC. Gillian draws on her multi-ethnic West Indian family and her intimate knowledge of production to create character-driven content for film, television and digital platforms. Gillian was a 2014 resident of the Canadian Film Centre's Primetime program under the showrunner Brad Wright (“Stargate”) Gillian developed “Travelers” (Netflix) and wrote Episode 2: ‘Protocol 6’, she currently writes for “Xavier Riddle and the Secret Museum” for PBS and “Endlings” for Hulu. Gillian has worked in the writer’s rooms of “X Company” and “Cavendish”, as well as several development rooms. Gillian co-directed the webseries "Night Owl" (SXSW 2018) and the BravoFact "Checking Out”, she co-produced Super Zee (WIFF 2019, OutlantaCon 2020, OutFest 2020) with an all P.O.C. crew. In 2018, Gillian was selected for Muslim Public Affairs Council: Hollywood Bureau's Drama TV Writer’s Lab; sponsored by the Emmy nominated Wise Entertainment. She is December 2018's Writer’s Guild of Canada Diverse Script of the Month for her police procedural "The Blue Division" and was selected by Ben Watkins (“Burn Notice”, “Hand of God”) as one of his Toronto Screenwriting Conference's Breakthrough Artists for 2019. Her feature script, "Hitchhiking in Saldanha", was shortlisted in the Praxis Screenplay Competition in 2013 and the ScreenCraft Fellowship Competition in 2014. Her pilot script for “The Player’s Son” is currently in the Top 100 on The Launch Pad. Her feature “The Favorite Wife” made the second round of the Austin Film Festival. Her pilot “Spinsters!” is on the We For She 2020 list of best unproduced female centred screenplays. Gillian also serves as a senior committee member of the BIPOC TV & Film Visioning Committee and the Black Women Film! Advisory Board.
Presented by York University Department of Cinema and Media Arts
Nadine Valcin Library and Archives Canada Artist in Residence
Watch the first episode of the Archive/Counter-Archive interview series, Talking Archives, which features conversations with artists, archivists, and researchers who are part of the A/CA network. Our first guest is Library and Archives Canada (LAC) Artist in Residence, Nadine Valcin, who was interviewed about her residency by A/CA's Project Director, Janine Marchessault. Nadine discusses the motivations behind her project, the archives that she has been working with, and what she hopes to accomplish during her residency.
Nadine Valcin is an award-winning bilingual producer, writer, and director. She has directed four documentary projects for the National Film Board of Canada, including the critically-acclaimed Black, Bold and Beautiful (1999) and Une école sans frontières (A School without Borders, 2008). She has written and directed three short films and is developing the virtual reality experience Ghosts of Remembrance about the forgotten history of slavery in Canada with funding from Ontario Creates and the Canada Media Fund. She holds a professional degree in architecture from McGill University and is an alumna of Doc Lab, Women in the Director’s Chair, and the National Screen Institute. She was an artist-in-residence at Osgoode Hall Law School at York University (2015/16) and the recipient of the 2016 WIFT-T/DGC Ontario Director Mentorship.
Archive/Counter-Archive is dedicated to activating and remediating audiovisual archives created by Indigenous Peoples (First Nations, Métis, Inuit), the Black community and People of Colour, womxn, LGBT2Q+ and immigrant communities. Political, resistant, and community-based, counter-archives disrupt conventional narratives and enrich our histories.
Conversation with Jeremy Harty, CCE and Cory Bowles about Black Cop July 21, 7pm ADT
The Canadian Cinema Editors, in partnership with BIPOC TV & Film presents: In Conversation with Jeremy Harty, CCE and Cory Bowles about the movie Black Cop. On its release in 2017, Black Cop garnered critical acclaim as an unapologetic challenge of race and police. With a range of visuals from body cam to camera phones - dash cam to traditional camera work, Black Cop made use of multiple techniques to bring a fast paced hyper connected narrative to life. Edited by Jeremy Harty, CCE and was the directorial debut for Cory Bowles. The event will be moderated by Shonna Foster.
Digital Roundtable Discussion Addressing Systemic Racism in Canada's Media Sector Wed July 22 at 2-3:30pm
On June 9, TIFF Co-Heads Joana Vicente and Cameron Bailey, and Board Chair Jennifer Tory, notified staff, TIFF Members, partners, industry, and media of TIFF’s commitment to combat systemic anti-Black racism internally, and beyond. As part of this commitment, we are accountable for confronting the many ways in which the Canadian arts sector has reinforced systemic racism in its programming, staffing, and audience engagement. As one of many steps to deliver on this commitment, we would like to invite you to a digital roundtable discussion with leaders from Telefilm Canada, the Indigenous Screen Office, the Canada Media Fund, CBC-Radio Canada, Bell Media, the NFB, and the Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television. Each will present how they are looking inward, and will discuss what they are doing to make sustainable change. Get an institutional perspective on what can be done to push reform and policy to ensure a more equitable industry and society. The roundtable will be introduced by Joana Vicente and will be followed by a Q&A.
PARTICIPANTSCameron Bailey, TIFF Christa Dickenson, Telefilm Canada Jesse Wente, Indigenous Screen Office Valerie Creighton, Canada Media Fund Catherine Tait, CBC-Radio Canada Randy Lennox, Bell Media Claude Joli-Coeur, NFB Beth Janson, Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television
[ed--Important to keep making these institutions accountable!]
Virtual Event How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi on Mon July 20 at 7pm EDT
Free. ASL interpretations and live captions will be provided. 2019 Guggenheim Fellow and New York Times bestselling author Ibram X. Kendi will discuss his renowned book “How to Be an Antiracist” on Monday, July 20 at 7:00 p.m. with Dr. Charlene M. Dukes, president of Prince George’s Community College. Dr. Dukes is the first African-American woman to serve as president of the College and has 30 years of progressive leadership experience and administrative responsibility in higher education. The conversation will be streamed live online on Crowdcast, Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter/Periscope, and will air on PGCC TV on a later date. Praised as “The most courageous book to date on the problem of race in the Western mind” (New York Times), Kendi’s groundbreaking work has provided a major new counterpoint in the national conversation about race in America and resonates in this, our collective moment of reckoning.
Virtual Book Launch I Am Not Your Negro: A Docalogue (ed. Jaimie Baron and Kristen Fuhs) Wed July 22 from 1-3:30pm PST
About the Book: James Baldwin’s writing is intensely relevant to contemporary politics and culture, and Peck’s strategies for representing him and conveying his work in I Am Not Your Negro (2016) raise important questions about how documentary can bring the work of a complex thinker like Baldwin to a broader public. By combining five distinct perspectives on a single documentary film, I Am Not Your Negro: A Docalogue offers different critical approaches to the same media object, acting both as an intensive scholarly treatment of a film and as a guide for how to analyze, theorize, and contextualize a documentary. The essays in the book include “I Am Not Your Negro’s queer poetics of identity and omission” (Courtney R. Baker), “James Baldwin’s embodied absence: I Am Not Your Negro and filmic corporeality” (Laura Rascaroli), “‘Some One of Us Should Have Been There with Her’: gender, race, and sexuality in I Am Not Your Negro and contemporary Black experimental documentary” (Ellen C. Scott), “James Baldwin: The Price of the Ticket (1989) and I Am Not Your Negro (2016) as historicist documentaries” (Stephen Casmier), and “Techniques for truth-telling from Haitian Corner to I Am Not Your Negro” (Toni Pressley-Sanon). About the Book Launch: Please join us virtually on Wednesday, July 22 from 1-3:30pm PST. Authors Courtney R. Baker, Laura Rascaroli, Ellen C. Scott, Stephen Casmier, and Toni Pressley-Sanon will introduce their chapters, and Allyson Field will then lead a discussion with the authors. If you would like to read the book in advance of the launch, it is available for free here for a limited time: https://www.book2look.com/book/ZAKaIgmibu The Zoom link for the launch is: https://zoom.us/j/98793459808