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DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20080404T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20080404T210000
DTSTAMP:20220722T154749Z
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SUMMARY:"Strange Culture" Screening with Steve Kurtz
DESCRIPTION:Lynn Hershman Leeson’s Strange Culture (2007) is a brilliantly conceived documentary that breaks conventional rules to tell a story of post-9/11 paranoia and the risks artists face when their work questions government policies. The subject of this film- artists and college professor Steve Kurtz- has been charged as a suspected terrorist and faces up to 20 years in prison. He will be in attendance for this benefit event. NEW LOCATION: Christ Church\, 35 State St. \n\n\n\nCo-sponsored by the Department of the Arts at RPI. \n\n\n\nStill from Strange Culture.\n\n\n\n \n\n\n\nAbout the Film:\n\n\n\nArtist and college professor Steve Kurtz was preparing for a MASS MoCA exhibition that lets audiences test whether food has been genetically modified when\, days before the opening\, his wife tragically died of heart failure. Distraught\, Kurtz called 911\, but when medics arrived\, they became suspicious of his art supplies and called the FBI. Dozens of agents in haz-mat suits sifted through his home and impounded his computers\, books\, cat\, and even his wife’s body. The government held Kurtz as a suspected terrorist\, and\, nearly three years later\, the charges have not been dropped. He still faces up to 20 years in prison. \n\n\n\nBecause Kurtz cannot legally talk about the case\, Leeson enlists actors\, including Tilda Swinton\, Josh Kornbluth\, and Peter Coyote\, to interpret the story. Leeson skillfully weaves dramatic reenactment\, news footage\, animation\, testimonials\, and footage of Kurtz himself into a sophisticated documentary about post-9/11 paranoia and the risks artists face when their work questions government policies.
URL:https://www.mediasanctuary.org/event/strange-culture-screening-with-steve-kurtz/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Screening,Speaker
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20080406T180000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20080406T213000
DTSTAMP:20220331T174926Z
CREATED:20220331T174926Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20220331T174926Z
UID:10001349-1207504800-1207517400@www.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:"Promised Paradise: How Can One Believe That Terrorism Leads To Heaven?" with Filmmaker Leonard Helmrich
DESCRIPTION:Leonard Retel Helmrich is an internationally recognized Indonesian filmmaker. His featured documentary The Eye of the Day (2001) made him famous in the documentary film world. The follow-up\, Shape of the Moon (2004)\, was selected for many important festivals and won the top documentary award at the Sundance Film Festival. In Helmrich’s Promised Paradise: How Can One Believe That Terrorism Leads To Heaven?\, the Jakarta-based Indonesian puppeteer and troubadour Agus Nur Amal travels to Bali to call to account the people who were responsible for the bomb attack on a nightclub there on 12 October 2002. Come early for a 6 PM potluck with the artist! \n\n\n\nCo-Sponsored by the Department of the Arts at RPI.  \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nStill from Promised Paradise: How Can One Believe That Terrorism Leads To Heaven?\n\n\n\nAbout the Film:\n\n\n\nIn Promised Paradise: How Can One Believe That Terrorism Leads To Heaven?  the Jakarta-based Indonesian puppeteer and troubadour Agus Nur Amal travels to Bali to call to account the people who were responsible for the bomb attack on a nightclub there on 12 October 2002. Like in his theatre shows\, humour is his main weapon. Before an audience of children\, we see him enact the attack on the Word Trade Center inside a gigantic “TV set.” The doll of Osama Bin Laden swaying his hips gets his audience roaring with laughter. But people stop laughing when his shadow play about the WTC disaster changes into images of new bomb attacks in Indonesia–first on the Australian Embassy in September 2004\, and later in Bali in October 2005. Director Leonard Retel Helmrich\, the 2004 winner of the Joris Ivens Award with The Shape of the Moon (De Stand van de Maan)\, uses ingenious editing to have Agus talk with the brain behind the attack in a “TV interview.” Agus also consults a paranormal advisor and asks him where the perpetrators of the suicide attack are now. “Their heaven is our hell\,” is the conclusion. But while Agus is in Bali\, his friend Endang\, who is still in Jakarta\, falls prey to intolerance and violence. (Source: IDFA catalogue) \n\n\n\nAbout Leonard Retel Helmrich:\n\n\n\nLeonard Retel Helmrich’s work includes the short fiction film De Drenkeling (The Drowning Man)\, the feature-length film The Phoenix Mystery\, and the multiple award-winning documentary Moving Objects (1991). He shot several short documentaries before\, during and after Suharto stepped down as president of Indonesia. With his feature documentary The Eye of the Day\, he instantly became famous in the documentary film world and won many international awards. Shape of the Moon\, a follow-up to The Eye of the Day\, was selected for many important festivals including the top documentary award at the Sundance Film Festival.
URL:https://www.mediasanctuary.org/event/promised-paradise-how-can-one-believe-that-terrorism-leads-to-heaven-with-filmmaker-leonard-helmrich/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Screening,Speaker
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20080408T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20080408T210000
DTSTAMP:20220404T152143Z
CREATED:20220331T181251Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20220404T152143Z
UID:10001350-1207681200-1207688400@www.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:African Film Festival Featuring "Bling\, A Planet Rock\," with Filmmaker Raquel Cepeda and "Growing Stronger"
DESCRIPTION:Filmmaker Raquel Cepeda presents Bling A Planet Rock (2007)\, a feature documentary by Raquel Cepeda\, takes a hard-hitting look at how “blinging” in the flashy world of commercial hip-hop played a role in the 10-year civil war in Sierra Leone. This film takes U.S. hip-hop celebrities Paul Wall\, Latin hip-hop artist Tego Calderon\, and Raekwon from Wu-Tang Clan on a journey to Sierra Leone’s diamond mining communities\, introducing them to former child soldiers\, refugees\, and local hip-hop artists.  \n\n\n\nIncluded in this screening is Growing Stronger (2005) by Tsitsi Dangarembga. After living a high profile life as a model and wife to the coach of the Zimbabwe national football team\, Tendayi Westerhof stunned the nation by becoming the first high profile person to go public about her HIV-positive status in 2002. Part of the African Film Festival program. \n\n\n\nBecause the Sanctuary has been shut down by the City of Troy in an action currently under investigation by the New York Civil Liberties Union\, historic A.M.E. Zion Church at 189 Fifth Avenue (corner of 103rd Street in north Troy) has offered sanctuary to the Sanctuary. \n\n\n\nLocal presentation of the African Film Festival is made possible with volunteer labor and hundreds of individual donations from patrons of The Sanctuary for Independent Media\, co-sponsored by the Arts Department at RPI\, A.M.E. Zion Church and the New York State Council on the Arts. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nProduction still from Bling: A Planet Rock. Photograph by Irena Mihova.\n\n\n\nAbout the African Film Festival at the Sanctuary for Independent Media:\n\n\n\nThe Sanctuary for Independent Media’s annual African Film Festival begins in Troy on Tuesday\, April 8\, 2008. We will be presenting four feature films (including\, on the opening night of the festival\, Bling: A Planet Rock director Raquel Cepeda)\, four short subjects and an evening of African music with Grammy Award-nominated kora master Mamadou Diabate and his quartet. \n\n\n\n“From Egypt to South Africa\, veteran filmmakers are using film to address the issues changing the face of the African continent today\,” said Mahen Bonetti\, founder and executive director of the AFF. “Additionally\, technology is empowering emerging filmmakers to add their voices to those telling Africa’s stories.” \n\n\n\nEach evening of the Festival features one full-length film and one short: on Tuesday\, April 8; Wednesday\, April 9; Tuesday\, April 15 and Wednesday\, April 16. Films begin at 7 PM. In addition\, the music of Malian kora great Mamadou Diabate and his ensemble will be featured live in a concert at 8 PM on Friday\, April 11. The film lineup includes: \n\n\n\nBling: A Planet Rock (Raquel Cepeda\, Sierra Leone/USA. 2007\, 90″) A documentary about American hip-hop culture’s obsession with diamonds—“blinging”—and all its social trappings\, and how this infatuation correlated with the ten-year conflict in Sierra Leone\, West Africa. The film follows three rappers—Paul Wall\, Tego Calderon\, and Raekwon—as they trek to the country to meet the survivors\, perpetrators and diamond miners in the country. The film also features Kanye West\, Juelz Santana\, Jadakiss and former child soldier/author Ishmael Beah. \n\n\n\nGrowing Stronger (Tsitsi Dangarembga\, Zimbabwe. 2005\, 30″) After living a high profile life as a model and wife to the then-coach of the Zimbabwe national football team\, Tendayi Westerhof stunned the nation by becoming the first high profile person to go public about her HIV positive status in 2002. Her enemies increased\, some going to the extent of calling her disclosure a publicity gimmick. This beautiful woman has gone on to become a public figure in a very different way\, as an elegant and glamorous AIDS activist in the world of modeling and the public media. \n\n\n\nAbout the Filmmakers:\n\n\n\nRaquel Cepeda is an award-winning editor and multi-media journalist\, producer and filmmaker\, as well as a multi-cultural media consultant specializing in translating news and social/global issues into an authentic language that is palatable to younger generations—18-34 years of age—stateside and abroad. Cepeda is the director and writer Bling: A Planet Rock\, co-produced with a19\, VH1\, and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). She also served as a creative consulting producer on From Mambo to Hip-Hop\, directed by Henry Chalfant (Style Wars) for PBS (2007). \n\n\n\nCurrently\, Cepeda is in production on BLOW US UP!\, a wartime concert documentary starring platinum selling rapper Paul Wall and TV Johnny who will journey into the past to see the future—in Iraq and Johnny’s homeland\, Vietnam. Following in the tradition of the highly acclaimed Bling: A Planet Rock\, BLOW US UP! uses the medium of hip-hop to engage a new audience in the history of two American wars\, a generation and musical genre apart from each other. \n\n\n\nMalian kora musician\, Mamadou Diabate is a member of the Mandinka West African jeli (musician caste) family. His musical lineage goes back seven centuries to the time of Sunjata Keita\, the conqueror of the Malian empire. Now based in the United States\, Mamadou performs around North America and Europe. Interested in bringing the kora to new audiences\, he has played with jazz and other contemporary artists\, however he remains rooted in the traditions of the Manding kora and his griot heritage. He is one of a handful remaining kora players that are keeping alive the kora tradition. \n\n\n\nAbout the African Film Festival\n\n\n\nThe African Film Festival (AFF) is a New York non-profit arts organization. The organization\, established in 1990\, began as an ad hoc committee of African and American artists and scholars. In the 1950s and ’60s\, African filmmakers began to create images of post-colonial Africa with nuanced understanding of Africa’s cultural diversity. Over the last half a century\, having sliced through stereotypes with exacting social critique\, African cinema has become a unique blend of aesthetic experimentation\, history\, and politics. As African nations have constructed modern identities from traditional and colonial experiences\, the role of visual culture in communicating these new transitional identities has immediacy for audiences around the world. The impetus for themes such as colonialism\, post-independence corruption\, and chronicles of “tribal” customs often erupts from the ironies of contemporary life. But African filmmakers also draw from springs of myth\, fantasy\, humor\, and magic to nourish a narrative sensibility in which tradition and modernity encounter each other. The oral traditions\, unique pacing\, and non-linear style of African story-telling have in fact become classifying characteristics of African filmmaking. This kind of art is a powerful intellectual and emotional force for social change.  \n\n\n\nAs the twenty-first century begins\, we are witnessing a great revolution in mass communications capabilities that drastically reduces the distances between cultures. Images\, sounds\, and ideas are being exchanged almost instantaneously\, creating dynamic hybrid cultures. As Western consumer culture has influenced global society\, so it has been invigorated by the differing sensibilities\, traditions\, and styles of other cultures. Likewise\, African film has evolved from its early exploration of colonialism into a new\, diasporic\, and international consciousness. For the past decade\, the African Film Festival has bridged the divide between post-colonial Africa and the American public through the medium of film. AFF’s unique place in the international arts community is distinguished not only by leadership in festival management but a comprehensive approach to the advocacy of African film and culture. We are particularly mindful of the many ways in which cinema is as much a medium of cultural exchange as an educational gate-way. \n\n\n\nAbout the AME Zion Church of Troy\, NY:\n\n\n\nDevoted to religious\, educational and social causes\, the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church and its members have been instrumental in many of the freedom struggles of this nation\, dating back to the days when former slaves Frederick Douglass\, Sojourner Truth and Harriet Tubman led the first wave of Black social activism. Since that time\, A.M.E. Zion members have made other significant contributions. AME Zion Bishop Alexander Walters\, along with Dr. W.E.B. DuBois\, helped to found the NAACP. Bishop Walters was also a pioneering member of the Pan-African Congress\, and many of the denomination’s clergy and lay people were active participants in the Civil Rights Movement of the ’60s. \n\n\n\nA.M.E. Zion Church made the salvation of the whole person–mind\, body and spirit–its top priority. At the crux of its ministry lay racial justice\, peace and harmony\, thus earning it the title\, the Freedom Church. \n\n\n\nAs the ministry expanded\, so did the denomination’s emphasis on education. “In order to succeed in American society as productive citizens\, we [the newly freed slaves] need to become an educated citizenry\,” an early AME Zion member once said. In keeping with that goal\, the Church maintains four colleges and universities today\, which are Livingstone College in Salisbury\, N.C.\, Clinton Junior College in Rock Hill\, S.C.\, and Lomax-Hannon Junior College in Greenville\, Alabama\, and A.M.E. Zion University in Monrovia\, Liberia. Additionally it maintains two theological seminaries\, Hood Theological Seminary in Salisbury\, NC and Hood Speaks Theological Seminary in Akwa Ibom State\, Nigeria. \n\n\n\nAlong with its emphasis on ministry and social change here in the United States\, the denomination has focused much of its attention and energies on outreach abroad. To date\, the A.M.E. Zion Church has member churches on all continents except Australia. In West Africa\, in particular\, the denomination has set up numerous schools and clinics throughout Ghana and Nigeria. The Church also has facilities in Liberia\, though some of its main structures have been destroyed by civil war. Overseas missions are a crucial component of the A.M.E. Zion Church’s outreach\, but the denomination believes in charity starting at home. That is why\, over the years\, several individual churches have implemented programs to help families to find low-income housing\, jobs\, financial planning assistance\, health care and day care services. “Our concern is for the whole person\,” says Bishop Cecil Bishop\, the (retired former) senior bishop of the A.M.E. Zion Church. “We have a holistic approach and a holistic gospel. We don’t feel that we live in a kind of compartmentalized sense\, but that life is a complete whole. So we have to be concerned about all of those amenities of life that help make up wholeness in an individual.” \n\n\n\nAbout The Sanctuary for Independent Media:\n\n\n\nThe Sanctuary for Independent Media is a telecommunications production facility dedicated to community media arts\, located in an historic former church in north Troy\, NY. The Sanctuary hosts screening\, production and performance facilities\, training in media production and a meeting space for artists\, activists and independent media makers of all kinds. On March 11\, 2008 the City of Troy closed The Sanctuary for Independent Media for alleged code violations just hours after the opening of a controversial series focusing on government intimidation and censorship under the guise of counter-terrorism. While the matter is being investigated by the NY Civil Liberties Union\, public events are being presented at Sanctuaries-in-exile throughout the Capital Region. \n\n\n\nAbout Rensselaer Polytechnic’s Department of the Arts:\n\n\n\nThe Department of the Arts at Rensselaer was founded in 1972. It is built around a world class faculty and is dedicated to interdisciplinary creative research in electronic arts\, offering a unique environment in which to develop and realize innovative art within a technological university. iEAR Presents! is a series of public performances\, exhibitions\, screenings and lectures. Curated by artist faculty\, iEAR Presents! seeks to bring artists into a creative dialogue regarding integrated electronic arts practice and theory with a participatory community of faculty and students from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and members of the general public.
URL:https://www.mediasanctuary.org/event/african-film-festival-featuring-bling-a-planet-rock-with-filmmaker-raquel-cepeda-and-growing-stronger/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Screening,Speaker
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20080409T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20080409T213000
DTSTAMP:20220415T155441Z
CREATED:20220401T160430Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20220415T155441Z
UID:10001602-1207767600-1207776600@www.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:African Film Festival Featuring "Clouds Over Conakry\," plus "Mama Put"
DESCRIPTION:Part of the African Film Festival\, a screening of Clouds Over Conakry (2007) by Cheick Fantamady Camara. At the age of 25\, the artist-caricaturist BB finds himself faced with an impossible choice. Son of Karamo\, the inflexible imam (who is also the guardian of his village’s ancestral traditions)\, BB is chosen to be his father’s worthy successor. But he refuses to accept his destiny\, preferring to fight to exert his trade freely and to live his love for the beautiful young computer scientist\, Kesso\, to the full. Presented with Seke Somolu’s Mama Put  (2006). The power of food to transform\, rescue\, and wreak revenge is eloquently demonstrated in this Nigerian film.  \n\n\n\nBecause the Sanctuary has been shut down by the City of Troy in an action currently under investigation by the New York Civil Liberties Union\, historic A.M.E. Zion Church at 189 Fifth Avenue (corner of 103rd Street in north Troy) has offered sanctuary to the Sanctuary. \n\n\n\nLocal presentation of the African Film Festival is made possible with volunteer labor and hundreds of individual donations from patrons of The Sanctuary for Independent Media\, co-sponsored by the Arts Department at RPI\, A.M.E. Zion Church and the New York State Council on the Arts. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nFilm still from Clouds Over Conakry.\n\n\n\nAbout the Films:\n\n\n\nClouds Over Conakry (Cheick Fantamady Camara\, Guinea. 2007\, 113″). A romantic twist on the standby theme of African cinema\, traditionalism vs. modernism\, as a lovestruck cartoonist learns the spirits have chosen him instead of his religious older brother to succeed his father as imam of Guinea’s capital\, Conakry. But he refuses to accept his destiny\, preferring to fight to exert his trade freely and to live his love to the full. \n\n\n\nMama Put (Seke Somolu\, Nigeria. 2006\, 26″). The power of food to transform\, rescue and wreak revenge is eloquently demonstrated in this Nigerian film. A single woman\, who makes and sells street food\, is struggling to bring up her family. Her young son desperately needs kidney treatment\, and just when it seems things can get no worse\, a gang of armed youths break in to the house. The mother decides that the gang must go\, and prepares a meal to send them on their way. \n\n\n\nAbout the African Film Festival\n\n\n\nThe African Film Festival (AFF) is a New York non-profit arts organization. The organization\, established in 1990\, began as an ad hoc committee of African and American artists and scholars. In the 1950s and ’60s\, African filmmakers began to create images of post-colonial Africa with nuanced understanding of Africa’s cultural diversity. Over the last half a century\, having sliced through stereotypes with exacting social critique\, African cinema has become a unique blend of aesthetic experimentation\, history\, and politics. As African nations have constructed modern identities from traditional and colonial experiences\, the role of visual culture in communicating these new transitional identities has immediacy for audiences around the world. The impetus for themes such as colonialism\, post-independence corruption\, and chronicles of “tribal” customs often erupts from the ironies of contemporary life. But African filmmakers also draw from springs of myth\, fantasy\, humor\, and magic to nourish a narrative sensibility in which tradition and modernity encounter each other. The oral traditions\, unique pacing\, and non-linear style of African story-telling have in fact become classifying characteristics of African filmmaking. This kind of art is a powerful intellectual and emotional force for social change.  \n\n\n\nAs the twenty-first century begins\, we are witnessing a great revolution in mass communications capabilities that drastically reduces the distances between cultures. Images\, sounds\, and ideas are being exchanged almost instantaneously\, creating dynamic hybrid cultures. As Western consumer culture has influenced global society\, so it has been invigorated by the differing sensibilities\, traditions\, and styles of other cultures. Likewise\, African film has evolved from its early exploration of colonialism into a new\, diasporic\, and international consciousness. For the past decade\, the African Film Festival has bridged the divide between post-colonial Africa and the American public through the medium of film. AFF’s unique place in the international arts community is distinguished not only by leadership in festival management but a comprehensive approach to the advocacy of African film and culture. We are particularly mindful of the many ways in which cinema is as much a medium of cultural exchange as an educational gate-way. \n\n\n\nAbout the AME Zion Church of Troy\, NY:\n\n\n\nDevoted to religious\, educational and social causes\, the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church and its members have been instrumental in many of the freedom struggles of this nation\, dating back to the days when former slaves Frederick Douglass\, Sojourner Truth and Harriet Tubman led the first wave of Black social activism. Since that time\, A.M.E. Zion members have made other significant contributions. AME Zion Bishop Alexander Walters\, along with Dr. W.E.B. DuBois\, helped to found the NAACP. Bishop Walters was also a pioneering member of the Pan-African Congress\, and many of the denomination’s clergy and lay people were active participants in the Civil Rights Movement of the ’60s. \n\n\n\nA.M.E. Zion Church made the salvation of the whole person–mind\, body and spirit–its top priority. At the crux of its ministry lay racial justice\, peace and harmony\, thus earning it the title\, the Freedom Church. \n\n\n\nAs the ministry expanded\, so did the denomination’s emphasis on education. “In order to succeed in American society as productive citizens\, we [the newly freed slaves] need to become an educated citizenry\,” an early AME Zion member once said. In keeping with that goal\, the Church maintains four colleges and universities today\, which are Livingstone College in Salisbury\, N.C.\, Clinton Junior College in Rock Hill\, S.C.\, and Lomax-Hannon Junior College in Greenville\, Alabama\, and A.M.E. Zion University in Monrovia\, Liberia. Additionally it maintains two theological seminaries\, Hood Theological Seminary in Salisbury\, NC and Hood Speaks Theological Seminary in Akwa Ibom State\, Nigeria. \n\n\n\nAlong with its emphasis on ministry and social change here in the United States\, the denomination has focused much of its attention and energies on outreach abroad. To date\, the A.M.E. Zion Church has member churches on all continents except Australia. In West Africa\, in particular\, the denomination has set up numerous schools and clinics throughout Ghana and Nigeria. The Church also has facilities in Liberia\, though some of its main structures have been destroyed by civil war. Overseas missions are a crucial component of the A.M.E. Zion Church’s outreach\, but the denomination believes in charity starting at home. That is why\, over the years\, several individual churches have implemented programs to help families to find low-income housing\, jobs\, financial planning assistance\, health care and day care services. “Our concern is for the whole person\,” says Bishop Cecil Bishop\, the (retired former) senior bishop of the A.M.E. Zion Church. “We have a holistic approach and a holistic gospel. We don’t feel that we live in a kind of compartmentalized sense\, but that life is a complete whole. So we have to be concerned about all of those amenities of life that help make up wholeness in an individual.” \n\n\n\nAbout The Sanctuary for Independent Media:\n\n\n\nThe Sanctuary for Independent Media is a telecommunications production facility dedicated to community media arts\, located in an historic former church in north Troy\, NY. The Sanctuary hosts screening\, production and performance facilities\, training in media production and a meeting space for artists\, activists and independent media makers of all kinds. On March 11\, 2008 the City of Troy closed The Sanctuary for Independent Media for alleged code violations just hours after the opening of a controversial series focusing on government intimidation and censorship under the guise of counter-terrorism. While the matter is being investigated by the NY Civil Liberties Union\, public events are being presented at Sanctuaries-in-exile throughout the Capital Region. \n\n\n\nAbout Rensselaer Polytechnic Department of the Arts:\n\n\n\nThe Department of the Arts at Rensselaer was founded in 1972. It is built around a world class faculty and is dedicated to interdisciplinary creative research in electronic arts\, offering a unique environment in which to develop and realize innovative art within a technological university. iEAR Presents! is a series of public performances\, exhibitions\, screenings and lectures. Curated by artist faculty\, iEAR Presents! seeks to bring artists into a creative dialogue regarding integrated electronic arts practice and theory with a participatory community of faculty and students from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and members of the general public.
URL:https://www.mediasanctuary.org/event/african-film-festival-featuring-clouds-over-conakry-plus-mama-put/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Screening
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20080415T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20080415T213000
DTSTAMP:20220404T145612Z
CREATED:20220401T165607Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20220404T145612Z
UID:10001603-1208286000-1208295000@www.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:African Film Festival featuring "Juju Factory\," plus "Menged"
DESCRIPTION:As part of the African Film Festival\, we present a screening of Balfua Bakupu-Kanyinda’s film Juju Factory (2007). Kongo Congo lives in Brussels\, in the Matange district on which he is writing a book. His editor wants a kind of traveler’s book spiced with ethnic ingredients. However\, the writer is inspired by the vision of complex and tormented souls that he meets at all crossings. Through his writing\, he meditates upon the invisible connections between Congolese history and its ghosts. How is it possible to stand upright in this chaotic history? By having the “juju”\, self confidence\, and Beatrice’s love.  \n\n\n\nScreened with Jean-Pierre Bekolo’s Menged (2006). Adopted from an Ethiopian folktale\, this film is very much a parable for Ethiopia today. A country in transition between modernism and traditional belief.  \n\n\n\nBecause the Sanctuary has been shut down by the City of Troy in an action currently under investigation by the New York Civil Liberties Union\, historic A.M.E. Zion Church at 189 Fifth Avenue (corner of 103rd Street in north Troy) has offered sanctuary to the Sanctuary.  \n\n\n\nLocal presentation of the African Film Festival is made possible with volunteer labor and hundreds of individual donations from patrons of The Sanctuary for Independent Media\, co-sponsored by the Arts Department at RPI\, A.M.E. Zion Church and the New York State Council on the Arts. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nStill from Balfua Bakupu-Kanyinda’s film Juju Factory. \n\n\n\nAbout the African Film Festival:\n\n\n\nThe African Film Festival (AFF) is a New York non-profit arts organization. The organization\, established in 1990\, began as an ad hoc committee of African and American artists and scholars. In the 1950s and ’60s\, African filmmakers began to create images of post-colonial Africa with nuanced understanding of Africa’s cultural diversity. Over the last half a century\, having sliced through stereotypes with exacting social critique\, African cinema has become a unique blend of aesthetic experimentation\, history\, and politics. As African nations have constructed modern identities from traditional and colonial experiences\, the role of visual culture in communicating these new transitional identities has immediacy for audiences around the world. The impetus for themes such as colonialism\, post-independence corruption\, and chronicles of “tribal” customs often erupts from the ironies of contemporary life. But African filmmakers also draw from springs of myth\, fantasy\, humor\, and magic to nourish a narrative sensibility in which tradition and modernity encounter each other. The oral traditions\, unique pacing\, and non-linear style of African story-telling have in fact become classifying characteristics of African filmmaking. This kind of art is a powerful intellectual and emotional force for social change.  \n\n\n\nAs the twenty-first century begins\, we are witnessing a great revolution in mass communications capabilities that drastically reduces the distances between cultures. Images\, sounds\, and ideas are being exchanged almost instantaneously\, creating dynamic hybrid cultures. As Western consumer culture has influenced global society\, so it has been invigorated by the differing sensibilites\, traditions\, and styles of other cultures. Likewise\, African film has evolved from its early exploration of colonialism into a new\, diasporic\, and international consciousness. For the past decade\, the African Film Festival has bridged the divide between post-colonial Africa and the American public through the medium of film. AFF’s unique place in the international arts community is distinguished not only by leadership in festival management but a comprehensive approach to the advocacy of African film and culture. We are particularly mindful of the many ways in which cinema is as much a medium of cultural exchange as an educational gate-way. \n\n\n\nAbout the A.M.E. Zion Church of Troy\, NY:\n\n\n\nDevoted to religious\, educational and social causes\, the A.M.E. Zion Church and its members have been instrumental in many of the freedom struggles of this nation\, dating back to the days when former slaves Frederick Douglass\, Sojourner Truth and Harriet Tubman led the first wave of Black social activism. Since that time\, A.M.E. Zion members have made other significant contributions. AME Zion Bishop Alexander Walters\, along with Dr. W.E.B. DuBois\, helped to found the NAACP. Bishop Walters was also a pioneering member of the Pan-African Congress\, and many of the denomination’s clergy and lay people were active participants in the Civil Rights Movement of the ’60s. A.M.E. Zion Church made the salvation of the whole person–mind\, body and spirit–its top priority. At the crux of its ministry lay racial justice\, peace and harmony\, thus earning it the title\, the Freedom Church.  \n\n\n\nAs the ministry expanded\, so did the denomination’s emphasis on education. “In order to succeed in American society as productive citizens\, we [the newly freed slaves] need to become an educated citizenry\,” an early AME Zion member once said. In keeping with that goal\, the Church maintains four colleges and universities today\, which are Livingstone College in Salisbury\, N.C.\, Clinton Junior College in Rock Hill\, S.C.\, and Lomax-Hannon Junior College in Greenville\, Alabama\, and A.M.E. Zion University in Monrovia\, Liberia. Additionally it maintains two theological seminaries\, Hood Theological Seminary in Salisbury\, NC and Hood Speaks Theological Seminary in Akwa Ibom State\, Nigeria. Along with its emphasis on ministry and social change here in the United States\, the denomination has focused much of its attention and energies on outreach abroad. To date\, the A.M.E. Zion Church has member churches on all continents except Australia.  \n\n\n\nIn West Africa\, in particular\, the denomination has set up numerous schools and clinics throughout Ghana and Nigeria. The Church also has facilities in Liberia\, though some of its main structures have been destroyed by civil war. Overseas missions are a crucial component of the A.M.E. Zion Church’s outreach\, but the denomination believes in charity starting at home. That is why\, over the years\, several individual churches have implemented programs to help families to find low-income housing\, jobs\, financial planning assistance\, health care and day care services. “Our concern is for the whole person\,” says Bishop Cecil Bishop\, the (retired former) senior bishop of the A.M.E. Zion Church. “We have a holistic approach and a holistic gospel. We don’t feel that we live in a kind of compartmentalized sense\, but that life is a complete whole. So we have to be concerned about all of those amenities of life that help make up wholeness in an individual.” \n\n\n\nAbout The Sanctuary for Independent Media:\n\n\n\nThe Sanctuary for Independent Media is a telecommunications production facility dedicated to community media arts\, located in an historic former church in north Troy\, NY. The Sanctuary hosts screening\, production and performance facilities\, training in media production and a meeting space for artists\, activists and independent media makers of all kinds. On March 11\, 2008 the City of Troy closed The Sanctuary for Independent Media for code violations just hours after the opening of a controversial series focusing on government intimidation and censorship under the guise of counter-terrorism. While the matter is being investigated by the NY Civil Liberties Union\, public events are being presented at Sanctuaries-in-exile throughout the Capital Region. \n\n\n\nAbout the Rensselaer Polytechnic Department of the Arts\n\n\n\nThe Department of the Arts at Rensselaer was founded in 1972. It is built around a world class faculty and is dedicated to interdisciplinary creative research in electronic arts\, offering a unique environment in which to develop and realize innovative art within a technological university. iEAR Presents! is a series of public performances\, exhibitions\, screenings and lectures. Curated by artist faculty\, iEAR Presents! seeks to bring artists into a creative dialogue regarding integrated electronic arts practice and theory with a participatory community of faculty and students from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and members of the general public.
URL:https://www.mediasanctuary.org/event/african-film-festival-featuring-juju-factory-plus-menged/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Screening
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20080416T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20080416T213000
DTSTAMP:20220404T151945Z
CREATED:20220305T231032Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20220404T151945Z
UID:10001589-1208372400-1208381400@www.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:African Film Festival Featuring "Les Saignantes\," Plus "Meokgo and the Stick Fighter"
DESCRIPTION:Jean-Pierre Bekolo’s Les Saignantes (2005) is a superbly photographed\, stylishly edited\, and tastefully scored film about two young femmes fatales who set out to rid a futuristic country of its corrupt and sex-obsessed powerful men. Young\, attractive\, fashionable\, and lethal\, they are on a mission to change the destiny of their country. Reveling in its display of excess\, committed to aesthetics of cool\, this is one of the first science fiction films to come out of Africa. \n\n\n\nScreened with Teboho Malatshi’s Meokgo and the Stick Fighter (2006)\, the story of Kgotso\, a recluse stick fighter who lives a solitary life high up in the Maluti Mountains of Lesotho. Whilst tending sheep and playing his concertina\, he sees a beautiful and mysterious woman staring at him dreamily from the water. This story of unrequited love and sacrifice captures both the cruelty and the beauty of African magical beliefs. Part of the African Film Festival program. \n\n\n\nBecause the Sanctuary has been shut down by the City of Troy in an action currently under investigation by the New York Civil Liberties Union\, historic A.M.E. Zion Church at 189 Fifth Avenue (corner of 103rd Street in north Troy) has offered sanctuary to the Sanctuary. \n\n\n\nLocal presentation of the African Film Festival is made possible with volunteer labor and hundreds of individual donations from patrons of The Sanctuary for Independent Media\, co-sponsored by the Arts Department at RPI\, A.M.E. Zion Church and the New York State Council on the Arts. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nFilm still from Jean-Pierre Bekolo’s Les Saignantes (2005).\n\n\n\nAbout the African Film Festival:\n\n\n\nThe African Film Festival (AFF) is a New York non-profit arts organization. The organization\, established in 1990\, began as an ad hoc committee of African and American artists and scholars. In the 1950s and ’60s\, African filmmakers began to create images of post-colonial Africa with nuanced understanding of Africa’s cultural diversity. Over the last half a century\, having sliced through stereotypes with exacting social critique\, African cinema has become a unique blend of aesthetic experimentation\, history\, and politics. As African nations have constructed modern identities from traditional and colonial experiences\, the role of visual culture in communicating these new transitional identities has immediacy for audiences around the world. The impetus for themes such as colonialism\, post-independence corruption\, and chronicles of “tribal” customs often erupts from the ironies of contemporary life. But African filmmakers also draw from springs of myth\, fantasy\, humor\, and magic to nourish a narrative sensibility in which tradition and modernity encounter each other. The oral traditions\, unique pacing\, and non-linear style of African story-telling have in fact become classifying characteristics of African filmmaking. This kind of art is a powerful intellectual and emotional force for social change.  \n\n\n\nAs the twenty-first century begins\, we are witnessing a great revolution in mass communications capabilities that drastically reduces the distances between cultures. Images\, sounds\, and ideas are being exchanged almost instantaneously\, creating dynamic hybrid cultures. As Western consumer culture has influenced global society\, so it has been invigorated by the differing sensibilities\, traditions\, and styles of other cultures. Likewise\, African film has evolved from its early exploration of colonialism into a new\, diasporic\, and international consciousness. For the past decade\, the African Film Festival has bridged the divide between post-colonial Africa and the American public through the medium of film. AFF’s unique place in the international arts community is distinguished not only by leadership in festival management but a comprehensive approach to the advocacy of African film and culture. We are particularly mindful of the many ways in which cinema is as much a medium of cultural exchange as an educational gate-way. \n\n\n\nAbout the AME Zion Church of Troy\, NY:\n\n\n\nDevoted to religious\, educational and social causes\, the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church and its members have been instrumental in many of the freedom struggles of this nation\, dating back to the days when former slaves Frederick Douglass\, Sojourner Truth and Harriet Tubman led the first wave of Black social activism. Since that time\, A.M.E. Zion members have made other significant contributions. AME Zion Bishop Alexander Walters\, along with Dr. W.E.B. DuBois\, helped to found the NAACP. Bishop Walters was also a pioneering member of the Pan-African Congress\, and many of the denomination’s clergy and lay people were active participants in the Civil Rights Movement of the ’60s. \n\n\n\nA.M.E. Zion Church made the salvation of the whole person–mind\, body and spirit–its top priority. At the crux of its ministry lay racial justice\, peace and harmony\, thus earning it the title\, the Freedom Church. \n\n\n\nAs the ministry expanded\, so did the denomination’s emphasis on education. “In order to succeed in American society as productive citizens\, we [the newly freed slaves] need to become an educated citizenry\,” an early AME Zion member once said. In keeping with that goal\, the Church maintains four colleges and universities today\, which are Livingstone College in Salisbury\, N.C.\, Clinton Junior College in Rock Hill\, S.C.\, and Lomax-Hannon Junior College in Greenville\, Alabama\, and A.M.E. Zion University in Monrovia\, Liberia. Additionally it maintains two theological seminaries\, Hood Theological Seminary in Salisbury\, NC and Hood Speaks Theological Seminary in Akwa Ibom State\, Nigeria. \n\n\n\nAlong with its emphasis on ministry and social change here in the United States\, the denomination has focused much of its attention and energies on outreach abroad. To date\, the A.M.E. Zion Church has member churches on all continents except Australia. In West Africa\, in particular\, the denomination has set up numerous schools and clinics throughout Ghana and Nigeria. The Church also has facilities in Liberia\, though some of its main structures have been destroyed by civil war. Overseas missions are a crucial component of the A.M.E. Zion Church’s outreach\, but the denomination believes in charity starting at home. That is why\, over the years\, several individual churches have implemented programs to help families to find low-income housing\, jobs\, financial planning assistance\, health care and day care services. “Our concern is for the whole person\,” says Bishop Cecil Bishop\, the (retired former) senior bishop of the A.M.E. Zion Church. “We have a holistic approach and a holistic gospel. We don’t feel that we live in a kind of compartmentalized sense\, but that life is a complete whole. So we have to be concerned about all of those amenities of life that help make up wholeness in an individual.” \n\n\n\nAbout The Sanctuary for Independent Media:\n\n\n\nThe Sanctuary for Independent Media is a telecommunications production facility dedicated to community media arts\, located in an historic former church in north Troy\, NY. The Sanctuary hosts screening\, production and performance facilities\, training in media production and a meeting space for artists\, activists and independent media makers of all kinds. On March 11\, 2008 the City of Troy closed The Sanctuary for Independent Media for alleged code violations just hours after the opening of a controversial series focusing on government intimidation and censorship under the guise of counter-terrorism. While the matter is being investigated by the NY Civil Liberties Union\, public events are being presented at Sanctuaries-in-exile throughout the Capital Region. \n\n\n\nAbout Rensselaer Polytechnic’s Department of the Arts:\n\n\n\nThe Department of the Arts at Rensselaer was founded in 1972. It is built around a world class faculty and is dedicated to interdisciplinary creative research in electronic arts\, offering a unique environment in which to develop and realize innovative art within a technological university. iEAR Presents! is a series of public performances\, exhibitions\, screenings and lectures. Curated by artist faculty\, iEAR Presents! seeks to bring artists into a creative dialogue regarding integrated electronic arts practice and theory with a participatory community of faculty and students from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and members of the general public.
URL:https://www.mediasanctuary.org/event/african-film-festival-featuring-les-saignantes-plus-meokgo-and-the-stick-fighter/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Screening
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR