AGITPROP Film Fest Poster

New UPLB Zoom Out Seal/Logo

1st AGITPROP International Film Festival UPLB Tour Organizing Team

Organizers: Southern Tagalog Exposure & UPLB Zoom Out Multimedia Collective

Co-Organizers: United Church of Christ in the Philippines and Karapatan -Southern Tagalog

Co-Presenters: UPLB Sociology Society, UPLB Delta Lambda Sigma Sorority, UPLB Babaylan, UPLB Kalikasan Environmental Action Movement-Southern Tagalog, UPLB Kulayan, UP Thursday Club

Major Sponsors: UP Community Broadcasters’ Society, UPLB Development Communicators’ Society, Samahang Ekolohiya ng UPLB, Haring Ibon UPLB, CFNR Student Council

Trailer | 1st AGITPROP International Film Festival on Peoples’ Struggles 2011

Catch “Wag Kang Titingin” at the Agitprop Int’l Film Fest – UPLB Tour on September 5-7 at UPLB.

Directed by Pam Miras | Digital Cheese | Fiction | 8 mins | 2010 | Philippines

A father and his two young daughters travel through a war-torn area. The father explains to his eldest why they needed to shield the youngest from what’s really happening around them. The eldest finally understands and vows to protect her sister. But how far will she go to keep her promise?

Awards:

Best Short, 6th Cinemalaya Independent Film Festival and Competition

Best Short Film, 34th Gawad Urian

Website: http://www.agitpropfilmfest.wordpress.com

Catch “Mirages of El Dorado” at the Agitprop Int’l Film Festival on September 5-7

Directed by Martin Frigon | Productions Multi-Monde| Documentary | 75 mins | 2008 | Canada/Chile

El Dorado leads us into the mountains of northern Chile, where the devastating operations of Canadian mining companies threaten a fragile ecosystem in one of the driest parts of the globe.

Our political cowboy flick follows the pitched battle between a farming community in the Huasco valley and Canada’s mining giant Barrick Gold with its sidekick Noranda (now part of the Suisse corporation Xstrata). It’s a battle fought high in the Cordilleran Andes where farmers and local representatives fear the ravages of open pit mining operations in a place where a fragile system of glaciers feeds the rivers that flow into the farmlands built out of the advancing Atacama desert.

The camera reveals a Chilean government impotent in the face of unprecedented, potentially devastating, mining projects. The film also exposes the hypocrisy of the Canadian government towards its own mining companies which corrupt foreign governments and weaken the process of environmental assessments. The permissive legislation enjoyed by the Canadian transnationals was imposed under the Pinochet dictatorship and carried over by successive transition governments, bowing to the dictates of neoliberal economics.

Awards:

Grand Prize 2008, 26th Festival International du Film d’Environnement 2008 in Paris

Grand Prize (Premio Festival) 2009, 7th Festival Internacional de Cine Digital de Vina del Mar

Mirage of

Catch CULTURES OF RESISTANCE @ AGITPROP Film Fest in UPLB

Director: Iara Lee

Producer: Caipirinha Productions

Country of origin: International (Brazil and USA)

Description: A film journey into the causes of contemporary war and conflict around the world, and an impassioned meditation on the apocalyptic problems facing humanity at this critical juncture in the history of the species.

The film captures the stories of creative change makers and international peace activists striving to turn our upside down world right side up- be it through work on disarmament/ nuclear nonproliferation, universal jurisdiction, top down/ground up diplomacy, or arts & culture to romote peace with justice. The voices of socially engaged artists provide the narrative thread to this rich mosaic film.  Their personal stories, told in many tongues, broaden our understanding of the geopolitical fault-lines that lie behind most modern day conflicts. By showcasing a variety of different and effective strategies for achieving positive and lasting change, we hope to inspire our audiences to further action and engagement.

Awards:

Best Documentary, Tiburon International Film Festival

Green Rose Award, Jaipur International Film Festival

Python Audience Prize, Jury Special Mentions, Ouidah International Film Festival

Best Documentary on Human Rights, Steps International Film Festival

AGITPROP Film Festival Tour @ UPLB

September 05 – 07 @ CAS Annex 2 Lecture Hall I  Ticket @ P40 w/ FREE pin button

Artists’ ARREST statement on the censorship of the Kulô exhibit at the CCP

At his point, any defense or attack of the artwork “Poleteismo” by Mideo Cruz is already moot and academic because it will always be subjective and it runs the danger of keeping our attention away from the more pressing concern at hand. We say this because, as it happens, the debate surrounding the artwork has been focused largely on its artistic and moral merits at the expense of calling our attention to what we think are more disturbing actions: the demand of a certain faction of the Catholic church for the resignation of the CCP officials; the vandalism of the artwork and in effect the CCP gallery in which it is in exhibit; and the decision of the CCP to close the exhibit.

People have come to the extent of calling the CCP an antichrist and Mideo a demon and the forum intended as a discussion about the exhibit turned into a rhetorical riot. But on the brighter side, some people have managed to intelligently either defend the artist’s work or attack it both based on well-placed intentions to serve the people and defend social values they think are in peril. These actions are very much welcome and acceptable. Cruz himself categorically stated that he is welcome to criticisms.  And we should encourage these criticisms and discussions if only to come to the most humane and useful appraisal and attitude towards the artwork. But at the moment, there is no reason to actually evict it out of the CCP gallery or, much worse, to destroy it.

That everybody is allowed to his or her opinion is a given in this situation. In the same respect that Cruz exercised his freedom of expression in his artwork which many find sickening and offending, everybody is welcome to express their opposition and even disgust to Cruz’s work up to the extent that it is constitutional and non-violent. At this point, Cruz is in fact already subject to gnashing criticisms by those who find his work offensive and they are very much free to expose or depict it for whatever farce or travesty that they think it is—in writing, through art, or even public assembly. The half-successful attempt of an unidentified man and woman to destroy the artwork of Cruz by defacing it and setting it on fire, albeit failed, however, is beyond acceptable. For one, it already constitutes criminal intent and ramifications not simply because it destroyed Cruz’s private property. Trying to set it on fire could’ve also burned the gallery or even the entire CCP. It is pretty much like “tirang pikon” as we say in Filipino.

Some may take it to the extreme by arguing that the vandalism performed could be also taken as a performance art and it should be granted the same liberty and tolerance given to Cruz. The Inquirer in its editorial on August 8, 2011 even went to somehow sanction the act by saying it is “understandable.” This line of logic is however short sighted because in his work, Cruz did not physically destroy anything.  You don’t destroy somebody else’s work if it sickens you as you are free to make your own art that can challenge that or write a scathing review or critique, whichever suits you best. You can even desecrate Cruz and/or his artwork in your dreams.

Now, the closing of the exhibit. That many people including fellow artists and activists like Cruz himself were offended was par for the course. The CCP President Ramon Sunico himself, in fact, expressed in a media interview that he was similarly offended by the artwork. The former first lady Imelda Marcos in the same media report has also somehow managed to find value in making a statement about the artwork and in the process possibly also redeemed herself again, something that her family has so successfully done over the years following their legendary economic and moral plunder of the nation. It would be interesting to note however that while Imelda thinks that the artwork shouldn’t have been given a place at the CCP, the CCP President who admits to have been equally offended, stood by his decision and opinion that the exhibit should be left as it is and resignation of the officials following the demands of a faction of the church is out of the question. That is of course until today when the CCP  eventually “temporarily closed” the exhibit allegedly for “security reasons.”

The action of the CCP is discouraging and even disturbing as it displays submission to unfair demands it initially ruled out. Saying the decision was prompted by security concerns sounds rather lame considering that the CCP found closing the exhibit unacceptable even after an actual attack of vandalism took place in the gallery itself. As such, we are deeply concerned about the fact that this decision came following the call of former first lady Imelda Marcos, considered as founder of the CCP and patron of the arts by some people, to close the exhibit which she says is contrary to the founding spirit of the CCP which is to display the good and the beautiful. If this line of argument sounds familiar, it is because this is the same justification espoused by Imelda in the censorship of films and other artworks during Martial Law, and which freedom fighters have valiantly fought so that we may enjoy today the freedom of expression commandeered by the Marcos Dictatorship.

We also find the statement of President Aquino in support to the action of the CCP smack of hypocrisy and dangerous. Aquino establishes his position by saying he sees no element of service in art that “insults the beliefs of most of the people.” Thus, one is tempted to ask Aquino what service does buying a Porsche did to the Filipinos, and why even if many people felt offended by his gesture, which smacks of fetishism, it was not dealt with censorship. No government institution was able to prevent him from driving his toy until he decided that it is not practical to keep. But more to the point, it is deeply alarming to hear the most powerful man in the country make a statement not only defining according to his terms what it is good or bad to say, but also sanctions the silencing of an idea which to other peoples’ mind has no value. And he makes this claim without having actually seen the artwork in question. Thus, his statement is not only carelessly done, it also spells fascism. It might also be good to remind the president that while the artwork offended the sensibilities of some people, it did not steal from them or hurt them in such a way that their basic rights were violated the way the Cojuancos and Hacienda Luisita Massacre, for instance, stole the land of the people and violently claimed the lives of farmers. That act of terror is what should be censored by way of giving back the land to the people and punishing the people behind the massacre.

We, thus, call on the CCP board to rethink its position about the closing of the exhibit for it already constitutes censorship. We also appeal to artists and citizens to see the higher social wager at stake in this situation: our freedom of expression.  We join other artists and groups in the action to defend our right to express ourselves.

1st AGITPROP Tour to kick-off this coming September in UPLB

After its succesful launch last July, the 1st AGITPROP film festival will kick-off its tour this coming September at the University of the Philippines in Los Baños, Laguna, Philippines, south of Manila.

Meanwhile, other cause-oriented groups from the United States and Australia are currently making plans to bring the festival to their respective countries.