CURATORIAL

Since 2018, the re-selected section has used the archive of the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen as a material basis for research and curated programs. The focus is on the festival’s own film collection, which has been assembled over almost 70 years by regularly acquiring archive copies of award-winning films. However, the archive in Oberhausen also includes festival publications and printed matter, as well as several hundred folders containing correspondence, internal communications, and “gray literature.” As the paper archive also bears witness to films that did not remain in Oberhausen or never arrived there, it forms a pronounced backdrop against which the film and contemporary historical profile of the Short Film Festival and the film archive emerge.

The 68th International Short Film Festival will feature four re-selected programs that subject key moments in the festival’s history to critical revision by placing the present and the absent in relation to one another. Program 1 (co-curated by Petra Belc and Aleksandra Miljković) is dedicated to the considerable number of archive copies from the former Yugoslavia as an “archive in exile.” Programs 2 and 3 (co-curated by Merv Espina and Karina Griffith) are critical retrospectives of the special program “Confrontation of Cultures,” which took place in Oberhausen in 1993 as an attempt at a postcolonial shift in discourse in post-reunification Germany. Program 4 honors the long-standing, not always conflict-free relationship that documentary filmmaker Peter Nestler has had with the Short Film Festival since the 1960s.Program 2: On All Fronts Curated by Karina Griffith “Confrontation of Cultures” was the name of a comprehensive discursive film program at the 1993 International Short Film Festival Oberhausen. Among other things, the project sought to explore Black aesthetics in film. According to festival director Angela Haardt, the aim of the symposium was to deconstruct the “Western, white, male” perspective and learn from artists who are “excluded from the principle of equality.” To this end, Black filmmakers and 47 films from North America, the United Kingdom, and the Caribbean were invited, along with guest curators Coco Fusco, June Givanni, and Monica Funke-Stern, and keynote speaker Diedrich Diederichsen. Although Black European film was a geographical category for the program selection, no films by Black Germans were shown. “Where are the German Black and POC filmmakers?” asked historian Tricia Rose during a public discussion. “On All Fronts,” curated by Karina Griffith, picks up on this question. As a speculative film program, it imagines Black films from Germany as part of the original 1993 project. The program mixes a selection of films from the original program with German films by Black authors that existed at the time, thus creating a new selection that transcends national borders. The Black film perspectives in “On All Fronts” find a polyphonic approach to sound and narration and, in their diverse content, address both internal struggles and external conflicts. The curatorial question is: How can we penetrate archives and histories and impose ourselves in order to evoke a reparative notion of cultural exchange? Karina Griffith is an artist, curator, and film scholar based in Berlin and Toronto. She teaches media theory and practice at the Institute for Art in Context (UdK) and has been part of the curatorial team of the Berlinale Forum Expanded since 2021. Film program Leugt Deutschland 1983, 16mm, 13′, black and white, German, English Director Raoul Peck This experimental film consists of still images of the violent protests during the visit of US President Ronald Reagan to (West) Berlin in 1982, as well as illustrations by French artist Gustave Doré. Leugt was made while Raoul Peck was studying at the German Film and Television Academy Berlin (DFFB). It documents the ideological confrontation in a multi-layered way, both acoustically and visually. Black Mother Black Daughter Canada, Caribbean 1989, 29′, color, English Director Sylvia Hamilton, Claire Prieto The community of Africville, founded by former slaves and Black Loyalists in Canada, was poorly served and wiped out in the 1960s by the provincial government under the pretext of “urban renewal.” Filmmaker Sylvia Hamilton is the narrator of this documentary about the resilient Black communities that survive, flourish, and continue to demand reparations. The a cappella music in the film is by For The Moment, a group that sings the oral traditions of Black people in Nova Scotia. Cycles USA 1989, 17′, black and white, English Director Zeinabu Irene Davis Mindful of her surroundings and her body and searching for balance, the protagonist in Cycles performs private rituals, carried by the intercession of her polyphonic inner dialogues. The songs in the film are by South African singer Miriam Makeba and American jazz trumpeter Clora Bryant. Davis was at the Confrontation of Cultures symposium in Oberhausen in 1993 to present her film. Mad Bad Mortal Beings United Kingdom 1992, 16mm, 10′, color, English Director Ludmilla Andrews The film was selected by curator June Givanni for the Confrontation of Cultures program in 1993. Mad Bad Mortal Beings (with Sophie Okonedo, Yvonne French, and Indra Ové) depicts the fantasy world, memories, and crisis of Cait, a completely desperate woman at the end of a relationship. In her dream world full of personal rituals, symbols, and metaphors, she confronts her own fears. A Lover & Killer of Colour Germany 1988, 16mm, 9′, color, German Director Wanjiru Kinyanjui Kinyanjui’s A Lover & Killer of Colour was made during her studies at the DFFB and was shown at the Oberhausen Short Film Festival in 1989. The film’s soundtrack, a poem by Alida Babel, describes various forms of expression—a pen writing on a white sheet of paper, a brush hitting a white canvas—as metaphors for the confrontation with white supremacy. Following the program at the Petit Café: Karina Griffith in conversation with Wanjiru Kinyanjui (live, online).

https://issuu.com/kurzfilmtage/docs/kurzfilmtage_katalog_final_2022/s/15667287