17th Berwick Film & Media Arts Festival 2021

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The Festival continues online until 30 September including performances, screenings, in-conversations, exhibitions, podcast and commissioned texts.

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Focus Discussion 2 : Precarity, asymmetries and independence in/of artistic practices from grassroots to diaspora

Following on from our Part 1 discussion with filmmakers from South Asia, we discuss the notions and realities of independence/dependency and asymmetry in the context of moving image practices from South East Asia.→

Upcoming Online Events:

Filmmakers in Focus: Anti-Archive in conversation
25 September 2021, 11:00
Essential Cinema: The Void Project Lecture / Performance
25 September 2021, 15:00
Work in Progress: Rising Up at Night Q&A
30 September 2021, 19:00

Past Online Events:

Propositions: If from every tongue it drips: Video Performance – co-presented with Open City Docs
Watch Recording ↗
Propositions: Seema Mattu & Zarina Muhammad present a Pasta and Argument Party
Watch Recording ↗
Propositions: Zia Anger & Monica Mirabile – Collaborative Performance
View Event Info ↗
Essential Cinema: Back inside herself – S.Pearl Sharp in conversation with Sarah Lasoye
Watch Recording ↗
Filmmakers in Focus: Nguyen Trinh Thi in conversation
Watch Recording ↗
Filmmakers in Focus: Rajee Samarsinghe in conversation
Watch Recording ↗
Propositions: Sung Hwan Kim in Conversation
Watch Recording ↗
NOTES: Abby Sun, Jemma Desai & Peter Taylor in Conversation
View Event Info ↗
Focus Discussion 1: Precarity, asymmetries and independence in/of artistic practices from grassroots to diaspora in South Asia
View Event Info ↗
19 August 2021

Guiding Thoughts

What is the Fate of the Middle Place? This title of our Young Filmmakers’ new short film refers to their future vision of Berwick-upon-Tweed. The question could be asked of the festival itself, where it acts as a middle place, a meeting between our local communities and the international communities of artists and filmmakers, and…→

Online Exhibitions

Berwick Film & Media Arts Festival’s 2021 Online Exhibitions take the place of its usual physical ones in Berwick. Here you’ll find places of radical world building, virtual spaces to gather and to contemplate.

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Back Inside Ourselves
NOTES (on programming BFMAF 2021)
SEEMAWORLD
When Amongst Our Own
Back Inside Ourselves
Ufuoma Essi, Tako Taal, Rhiana Bonterre
United Kingdom
19 mins’
NOTES (on programming BFMAF 2021)
United Kingdom
SEEMAWORLD
Seema Mattu
United Kingdom
When Amongst Our Own
Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley
United Kingdom
NOTES: Abby Sun, Jemma Desai & Peter Taylor in Conversation
24 September 2021, 11:00

Online Event
Essential Cinema: Back inside herself – S.Pearl Sharp in conversation with Sarah Lasoye
17 September 2021, 19:00

Online Event
Festival Catalogue

View 2021 Festival
Catalogue →

New Cinema Awards

The Berwick New Cinema Competition becomes the Berwick New Cinema Awards—a non competitive prize that is shared between the filmmakers. The strand encompasses a selection of work that has most spoken to our group of programmers this year and includes what we feel is some of the most distinctive works of new cinema and artists’ moving image being made around the world today.

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a body is a body is a body
A body is a body is a body, Alternative Economies, Galb’Echaouf, Matt Means Land
Wideshot. On the left, a rectangle photograph with the head of a senior Donald the Duck-esque cartoon wearing small glasses propped on its break. The background of the photo appears to be a golden brown field. This photo appears to be stuck on a glass wall, and the background is blurred with some white and purple objects.
Alternative Economies
Film still from El Planeta. Black and white wideshot of two white women side by side at the hair salon, having their hair washed in separate basins. They both have wet hair, and are laying back with their heads in the basins, looking up to the ceiling.
El Planeta
Wideshot still from Feast. Close up of hands wearing surgical blue gloves using a long and thin metal device and holding a flower bud with pastel pink and yellow petals. The hands are pointing the metal tool into the petals. The background is blurred, mostly blue but on the right hand side there's a patch of blurred pastel and darker colours.
Feast
Wideshot still from Galb'Echaouf. Close up of a spikey, light brown bush. The background is a blue sky.
Galb’Echaouf
Golden Jubilee
Idrish (ইদ্রিস)
Still from La Nave. Wideshot with moody lighting, and a background of cloudy skies. In the centre, the suject is facing the camera, looking to the distance. They're wearing facepaint and makeup, and a colourful outfit and headpiece that has thick, dramatic, curling horns.
La Nave
Film still from Maat means Land. A close up of a colourful conch shell like object. It has a pink, brain like rim and outer layer, with a white middle that has a glowing orange light peeking out.
Maat means Land
Film still from Manifesto. Wideshot of a white classroom with colourful artwork on the wall. On the left, a man in a red open shirt is leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. On the right, a person in blue jeans and an orange top is walking in motion and looking at the art.
Manifesto
Film still from Manifesto. Wideshot of a white classroom with colourful artwork on the wall. On the left, a man in a red open shirt is leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. On the right, a person in blue jeans and an orange top is walking in motion and looking at the art.
Manifesto, Tender Point Ruin, Suspiration!
Film still from Passion of Remembrance. A four way split television set, with four images of a Black woman with afro hair in a square frame. Her background is orange.
Passion of Remembrance
Passion of Remembrance & Golden Jubilee Trilogy
Still from Rock Bottom Riser. A wideshot of a huge deep blue wave. It looks like its merging into the blue sky above it.
Rock Bottom Riser
Still from Shared Resources. Side profile shot of a white person with their hands over their face. The subtitle "(Laughter)" is at the bottom in white writing against a black background.
Shared Resources
Suspiration!
Tender Point Ruin
a body is a body is a body
Éiméar McClay, Cat McClay
United Kingdom
13 mins’
Alternative Economies
Rehana Zaman
United Kingdom
28 mins’
El Planeta
Amalia Ulman
81 mins’
Feast
Tim Leyendekker
85 mins’
Galb’Echaouf
Abdessamad El Montassir
Morocco, Western Sahara
18 mins’
Golden Jubilee
Suneil Sanzgiri
United States
47 mins’
Idrish (ইদ্রিস)
Adam Lewis Jacob
32 mins’
La Nave
Carlos Maria Romero
52 mins’
Maat means Land
Fox Maxy
United States
30 mins’
Manifesto
Ane Hjort Guttu
Norway
27 mins’
Passion of Remembrance
Salad Hilowle
Sweden
26 mins’
Rock Bottom Riser
Fern Silva
United States
70 mins’
Shared Resources
Jordan Lord
United States
98 mins’
Suspiration!
Camara Taylor
United Kingdom
23 mins’
Tender Point Ruin
Sophia Al-Maria
United Kingdom
25 mins’
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Focus

Nguyễn Trinh Thi

Nguyễn Trinh Thi is one of Vietnam’s leading contemporary artists. Her moving image work engages with the ways in which memory, history and representation are part of broader structures of power, the legacies of colonialism and war, and the erasure of indigenous Vietnamese cultures.

Still from Fifth Cinema. The background is black, and in the centre near the bottom, there's small white letters with accents, words that aren't English. They read "'lẵn bộ tộc". Below this is the English translation "a tribal background" in small yellow writing. Above this writing, a young Vietnamese woman at 90 degrees counter clockwise. They're wearing roller skates, a blue and red sweater, and a green jumper tied around their waist.
Fifth Cinema
Still from Fifth Cinema. The background is black, and in the centre near the bottom, there's small white letters with accents, words that aren't English. They read "'lẵn bộ tộc". Below this is the English translation "a tribal background" in small yellow writing. Above this writing, a young Vietnamese woman at 90 degrees counter clockwise. They're wearing roller skates, a blue and red sweater, and a green jumper tied around their waist.
Fifth Cinema
Film still from How To Improve The World. Wideshot of a wide dirt path with houses and wooden fences on either side, and trees in the background. There's Vietnamese people on the path and the fences.
How to Improve the World
Film still from How To Improve The World. Wideshot of a wide dirt path with houses and wooden fences on either side, and trees in the background. There's Vietnamese people on the path and the fences.
How to Improve the World & Landscape Series #1
Still from Landscape Series #1. The background consists of tightly packed trees with green leaves, greenery, and bushes with varying shades of green shrubbery. On the left, a person dressed in white and wearing a white bucket hat is pointing towards the trees.
Landscape Series #1
Wideshot still from Letters from Panduranga. Close up shot of the shoulders and face of an elderly Vietnamese person. They're wearing glasses, a scarf-like headpiece, and long red, threaded earrings. The background is a small village.
Letters from Panduranga
Fifth Cinema
Vietnam
55 mins’
How to Improve the World
Vietnam
47 mins’
Landscape Series #1
Vietnam
5 mins’
Letters from Panduranga
Vietnam
34 mins’
Foraging in the Ruins: Nguyễn Trinh Thí’s mycological moving image practice
by Philippa Lovatt

Essay
Filmmakers in Focus: Nguyen Trinh Thi in conversation
18 September 2021, 12:00

Online Event
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Anti-Archive

Since its founding in 2014, the Cambodian film production company Anti-Archive has emerged as a formidable platform through which the new generation of filmmakers in Cambodia can develop their artistic visions, realise ambitious productions and collaborate with others internationally.→

Still from Sunrise in My Mind. Wideshot of a beauty salon in Cambodia. On the right, a Cambodian women wearing a mask is getting her hair washed in a basin by another Cambodian woman who is standing up. The customer is lying back with her hair in the basin and she's on her phone.
Film still from A Scale Boy. A wideshot of a young Cambodian boy with short black hair, wearing a white shirt and a schoolbag satchel over his shoulder. His back is facing the camera, and he's walking along a path next to a red brick building.
A Scale Boy
Film still from A Scale Boy. A wideshot of a young Cambodian boy with short black hair, wearing a white shirt and a schoolbag satchel over his shoulder. His back is facing the camera, and he's walking along a path next to a red brick building.
Anti-Archive Shorts
Film still from Boding. A bird eye's view shot of a white car in a car park, with several people on motorbikes spread around the car.
Boding
Film still from California Dreaming. A wideshot of Sarita, a young woman of colour with black hair up in a bun. She's wearing a white shirt and is standing up and looking out into the distance. Behind her is the ocean horizon. The skies are grey, and the water a grey blue.
California Dreaming
Film still from Cambodia 2099. On the left hand side, a close up shot of someone's face illuminated by a blueish light. The rest of the shot is submerged in darkness.
Cambodia 2099
Wideshot still from Golden Slumbers. A dark, dusk background with outlines of buildings. A group of four white men in suits and red ties standing, spread out and looking in different directions. One is sat on a chair, three are standing,
Golden Slumbers
Last Night I Saw You Smiling
Still from Sunrise in My Mind. Wideshot of a beauty salon in Cambodia. On the right, a Cambodian women wearing a mask is getting her hair washed in a basin by another Cambodian woman who is standing up. The customer is lying back with her hair in the basin and she's on her phone.
Sunrise in My Mind
Turn Left, Turn Right
A Scale Boy
Kavich Neang
Cambodia
16 mins’
Boding
Kanitha Tith
Cambodia
9 mins’
California Dreaming
Sreylin Meas
Cambodia
16 mins’
Cambodia 2099
Davy Chou
Cambodia, France
21 mins’
Golden Slumbers
Davy Chou
Cambodia, France
96 mins’
Last Night I Saw You Smiling
Kavich Neang
Cambodia, France
77 mins’
Sunrise in My Mind
Danech San
Cambodia
14 mins’
Turn Left, Turn Right
Douglas Seok
Cambodia, South Korea, United States
68 mins’
Filmmakers in Focus: Anti-Archive in conversation
25 September 2021, 11:00

Online Event
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Focus

Rajee Samarasinghe

Rajee Samarasinghe’s body of work tackles contemporary sociopolitical conditions in Sri Lanka through the scope of his own identity and the deconstruction of ethnographic practices. BFMAF 2021 presents a series of Samarasinghe’s 12 short films shot over a decade—an archive of images navigating the terrain of migration, memory, and impermanence.

Still from Show Me Other Places. Shot of a forearm and hand reaching and grabbing someone else's wrist. The person grabbing the other person's wrist is wearing a watch. The background is a beige white.
Black and white, dark wideshot. A bird eye's view of a Black person's chest and head as they are lying down, with their head tilted to the side and their eyes closed. They are lying down horizontally with their head at the right hand side.
black widow summer set
Still from Everyday Star. A black and white close up shot looking downwards onto someone's face, with shadows on their cheeks and the sides of their face. The middle of their face is illuminated by light.. On the left, the top of their shoulder is visible, but the rest of the still is submerged in darkness.
Everyday Star
Portrait still from Foreign Quarters. A close up portrait shot of an older woman, with short black hair, wearing a white shirt. The portrait is cut off at the shoulders. She has a tired, somewhat sullen expression on her face. She's looking directly into the camera.
FOREIGN QUARTERS
Film still from If I Were Any Further Away I'd Be Closer To Home. Black and white wideshot. On the left, a woman wearing a dark top and a white skirt is touching the wall.
If I Were Any Further Away I’d Be Closer to Home
Black and white, dark wideshot. A bird eye's view of a Black person's chest and head as they are lying down, with their head tilted to the side and their eyes closed. They are lying down horizontally with their head at the right hand side.
Invisible Touch
Still from Misery Next Time: Wideshot, dull lighting. Downward shot of a forest floor covered with dead leaves, on the right hand side, a person bent down with their arm stretched out and touching the leave. They are wearing white.
Misery Next Time
Still from Show Me Other Places. Shot of a forearm and hand reaching and grabbing someone else's wrist. The person grabbing the other person's wrist is wearing a watch. The background is a beige white.
Show Me Other Places
The Exile
The Eyes of Summer
the past
The Queen of Material
The Spectre Watches Over Her
Untitled
black widow summer set
Sri Lanka, United States
8 mins’
Everyday Star
Sri Lanka, United States
9 mins’
FOREIGN QUARTERS
China, Sri Lanka, United States
15 mins’
If I Were Any Further Away I’d Be Closer to Home
Sri Lanka, United States
15 mins’
Invisible Touch
black widow summer set, everyday star, FOREIGN QUARTERS, If I Were Any Further Away I’d Be Closer to Home, Misery Next Time, Show Me Other Places, The Exile, The Eyes of Summer, the past, The Queen of Material, The Spectre Watches Over Her, Untitled
Sri Lanka, United States
111 mins’
Misery Next Time
Sri Lanka, United States
5 mins’
Show Me Other Places
Sri Lanka, United States
11 mins’
The Exile
Sri Lanka
8 mins’
The Eyes of Summer
Sri Lanka, United States
15 mins’
the past
Sri Lanka, United States
5 mins’
The Queen of Material
Sri Lanka, United States
2 mins’
The Spectre Watches Over Her
Sri Lanka, United States
14 mins’
Untitled
Sri Lanka, United States
4 mins’
APHOTIC VAPORS/YOU HAVE JUST BEEN ERASED
by Joshua Solondz

Essay
Filmmakers in Focus: Rajee Samarsinghe in conversation
18 September 2021, 19:00

Online Event

Essential Cinema

Essential Cinema is our pluralist retrospective series that provides a revisionist view of what might be considered canonical works of cinema. The 2021 selection brings new restorations and digitisations that evoke connections between political and spiritual awakenings, taking in projects from India, Cuba, USA and Palestine.

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Amma Ariyan (Report to Mother)
Back Inside Herself
Back Inside Ourselves – Workshop
Black and white still from One Way Or Another. A woman in a white top and with black hair in a bob hairstyle. She's writing with chalk on a blackboard, and has her head turned over her shoulder as she's writing.
One Way or Another
One Way or Another + Back Inside Herself
The Void Project
Amma Ariyan (Report to Mother)
John Abraham
115 mins’
Back Inside Herself
S. Pearl Sharp
United States
4 mins’
Back Inside Ourselves – Workshop
S. Pearl Sharp, Ufuoma Essi, Tako Taal, Rhiana Bonterre
United Kingdom
21 mins’
One Way or Another
Sara Gómez
Cuba
73 mins’
The Void Project
Ismail Shammout, Layaly Badr, Monica Maurer, Samir Nimr
Palestine
87 mins’
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Propositions

Propositions is the Festival’s hybrid of discussion and online screenings, interactive games and performances. The artists in this strand share discoveries encountered through their research, experience and practice.→

Still from Hair Is A Piece of Body. The background is made up of forestry and outlines of hills. The subject is a white person wearing a white cardigan and pink skirt, although the rest of their outfit and body is cut off at the hip. Their side profile is facing the camera, and their dark hair is being swept by wind, blowing upwards. It appears they are standing on a hill or the edge of one.
Hair Is A Piece of Body
Still from Hair Is A Piece of Body. The background is made up of forestry and outlines of hills. The subject is a white person wearing a white cardigan and pink skirt, although the rest of their outfit and body is cut off at the hip. Their side profile is facing the camera, and their dark hair is being swept by wind, blowing upwards. It appears they are standing on a hill or the edge of one.
Hair is a Piece of Head
Film still from If From Every Tongue It Drips. Abstract illustration portraying the lower half of a person's white dress and arms. The still has a black square outline, the subject appears to be behind a square window. The subject's background is dark red. Where their head should be, there's multi-coloured lines and blurriness.
If From Every Tongue it Drips
Online Collaborative Performance
SEEMAWORLD
Hair is a Piece of Head
Sung Hwan Kim
South Korea, United States
24 mins’
If From Every Tongue it Drips
Sharlene Bamboat
Canada, Sri Lanka, United Kingdom
67 mins’
Online Collaborative Performance
Zia Anger, Monica Mirabile
United States
SEEMAWORLD
Seema Mattu
United Kingdom
24 mins’
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SPS Community Media

BFMAF is pleased to present two recent films by SPS Community Media which provide a clarifying backdrop to urgent news stories such as the ongoing Farmer’s Protests in India, rooted in the experiences of individuals and families living in Madhya Pradesh, one of the most populous states in India.

Still from Hailstorm. Wide landscape shot of a golden white wheat field, on the left hand side, a young Indian boy, and in the middle, another young Indian boy. They're walking through the field. The background is trees and a dull blue sky.
Hailstorm
Wideshot film still from Entrance Exam. On the right hand side, two young boys sitting side by side, one of them writing something on a notepad, and the other peering over the boy's shoulder to read what he's writing. On the left, in the distance. a young boy sitting on a high metal fence with a book in his hands..
Entrance Exam
Still from Hailstorm. Wide landscape shot of a golden white wheat field, on the left hand side, a young Indian boy, and in the middle, another young Indian boy. They're walking through the field. The background is trees and a dull blue sky.
Hailstorm
Entrance Exam
Aditya Verma
India
60 mins’
Hailstorm
Shobhit Jain
India
61 mins’
Focus Discussion 1: Precarity, asymmetries and independence in/of artistic practices from grassroots to diaspora in South Asia
24 September 2021, 14:00

Online Event

Work in Progress

Returning for a second edition, Work in Progress is a Berwick Film & Media Arts Festival programme strand highlighting forthcoming feature-length films. For 2021’s Work in Progress, we will focus on Congolese director and visual artist Nelson Makengo’s Rising Up at Night (2022) his feature film debut currently in production.→

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Rising Up at Night: Work in Progress
Rising Up at Night: Work in Progress
Nelson Makengo
Belgium, Democratic Republic of the Congo
Work in Progress: Rising Up at Night Q&A
30 September 2021, 19:00

Online Event

Live Now

Focus Discussion 2 : Precarity, asymmetries and independence in/of artistic practices from grassroots to diaspora

Following on from our Part 1 discussion with filmmakers from South Asia, we discuss the notions and realities of independence/dependency and asymmetry in the context of moving image practices from South East Asia.→

Upcoming Online Events:

Filmmakers in Focus: Anti-Archive in conversation
25 September 2021, 11:00
Essential Cinema: The Void Project Lecture / Performance
25 September 2021, 15:00
Work in Progress: Rising Up at Night Q&A
30 September 2021, 19:00

Past Online Events:

Propositions: If from every tongue it drips: Video Performance – co-presented with Open City Docs
Watch Recording ↗
Propositions: Seema Mattu & Zarina Muhammad present a Pasta and Argument Party
Watch Recording ↗
Propositions: Zia Anger & Monica Mirabile – Collaborative Performance
View Event Info ↗
Essential Cinema: Back inside herself – S.Pearl Sharp in conversation with Sarah Lasoye
Watch Recording ↗
Filmmakers in Focus: Nguyen Trinh Thi in conversation
Watch Recording ↗
Filmmakers in Focus: Rajee Samarsinghe in conversation
Watch Recording ↗
Propositions: Sung Hwan Kim in Conversation
Watch Recording ↗
NOTES: Abby Sun, Jemma Desai & Peter Taylor in Conversation
View Event Info ↗
Focus Discussion 1: Precarity, asymmetries and independence in/of artistic practices from grassroots to diaspora in South Asia
View Event Info ↗

Podcasts

Camara Taylor in conversation with Myriam Mouflih
Listen ↗
Abdessamad El Montassir in conversation with Myriam Mouflih
Listen ↗
Jordan Lord in conversation with Jemma Desai
Listen ↗
Tim Leyendekker in conversation with Christina Demetriou
Listen ↗
Suneil Sanzgiri in conversation with Jemma Desai
Listen ↗
Salad Hilowle in conversation with Alice Miller
Listen ↗
Rehana Zaman in conversation with Jemma Desai
Listen ↗
Fern Silva in conversation with Herb Shellenberger
Listen ↗
Cat and Éiméar McClay in conversation with Christina Demetriou
Listen ↗
Carlos Maria Romero in conversation with Herb Shellenberger
Listen ↗
Ane Hjort Guttu in conversation with Herb Shellenberger
Listen ↗
Adam Lewis Jacob, Muhammad Idrish and Claude Nouk in conversation with Alice Miller
Listen ↗