The Robert Flaherty Film Seminar announces a new fellowship program for New England filmmakers. Fellowships are funded by LEF New England, a regional office of the LEF Foundation, and cover the entire registration fee as well as travel to the Seminar, which takes place June 20-26, 2009 at Colgate University in Hamilton, NY. Complete Fellowship program information and application procedures are available at the Flaherty website www.flahertyseminar.org.
Application deadline: March 13
The Robert Flaherty Film Seminar is named after Robert Flaherty (1884-1951), who is considered by many to be the father of the American documentary. Flaherty’s groundbreaking documentary of Eskimo life, Nanook of the North is among the most noted films of the silent era. He was also the creator of such classic poetic films as Moana, Man of Aran, and Louisiana Story. The Seminar began in 1955—before the era of film schools—when Flaherty’s widow, Frances, convened a group of filmmakers, critics, curators, musicians, and other film enthusiasts at the Flaherty farm in Vermont. more than fifty years the Flaherty Seminar has been firmly established as a one-of-a-kind institution that seeks to encourage filmmakers and other artists to explore the potential of the moving image.
The films of such directors as Robert Drew, Louis Malle, the Maysles brothers, Mira Nair, D.A. Pennebaker, Satyajit Ray, and Robert M. Young were shown at the Seminar before they were known generally in the American film community. New cinematic techniques and approaches first presented and debated at the Seminar have routinely made their way into mainstream American film.
About the 2009 Robert Flaherty Film Seminar
"Witnesses, Monuments, Ruins"
Moving images have become the most common mode of relating to the events of our time – whether catastrophic wars, political change, or precious moments of everyday life. These images capture the words and gestures of those who speak before a camera. They observe the monuments and ruins left by the past. And they interpret, intervene in, and re-invent the testimonial act itself. Programmed by Irina Leimbacher, the 2009 Flaherty Seminar will explore the act of bearing witness - bringing memory, experience, and history into the present - through an eclectic range of topics and formal approaches, in works from the Middle East, Asia, Latin America, Europe, and the United States. Invited artists include Omar Amiralay, Juan Manuel Echavarria, Amar Kanwar, and Beryl Korot.
The Flaherty/International Film Seminars, Inc.
6 East 39th St. 12th Floor
New York, NY 10016
Tel: 212.448.0457
Fax: 212.448.0458
E-mail: ifs@flahertyseminar.org
www.flahertyseminar.org
This is not an RIFC Production