Activism

Sylvia

Sylvia is a portrait of the civil rights pioneer Sylvia Rivera for her memorial service in 2002, as told by her chosen family immediately following her death. "A veteran of the 1969 Stonewall uprising, Sylvia was a tireless advocate for all those who have been marginalized as the 'gay rights' movement has mainstreamed. Sylvia fought hard against the exclusion of transgender people from the Sexual Orientation Non-Discrimination Act in New York, and was a loud and persistant voice for the rights of people of color and low-income queers and trans people." --SRLP.org

Video Data Bank

Steve Kurtz: An Interview

Steve Kurtz is a founding member of the Critical Art Ensemble and Associate Professor of Art at University of Buffalo. His areas of focus are contemporary art history and theory as well as post-studio practices. As a student Kurtz collaborated with Steve Barnes on low-tech videos, which they developed into a broad-based artist and activist collective known as the Critical Art Ensemble.

Interview by Gregg Bordowitz.

A historical interview originally recorded in 1999 and re-edited in 2005.

Köken Ergun

So Much

During my residency in New York I was designing a computer virus, which would contaminate computers through a screensaver that read “there is so much love in this world”. In the meanwhile, inspired by the illusionary democratic representation system in the United States and triggered by the indifference of the New York public to the presidential campaign, I went out to the streets to distribute fliers that carried this virus sentence. People of New York reacted in different ways to this action, which had similarities with many other hand-out actions common in big cities.

Harun Farocki

Workers Leaving the Factory

Workers Leaving the Factory - such was the title of the first cinema film ever shown in public. For 45 seconds, this still-existent sequence depicts workers at the photographic products factory in Lyon, owned by the brothers Louis and Auguste Lumière, hurrying, closely packed, out of the shadows of the factory gates and into the afternoon sun. Only here, in departing, are the workers visible as a social group. But where are they going? To a meeting? To the barricades? Or simply home?

Videofreex

Women's Lib Demonstration NYC

Ten thousand women marched down New York's Fifth Avenue on August 26th, 1970, to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the passage of the 19th amendment, which granted women the right to vote. The march was part of a "Women's Strike for Equality" organized by veteran feminist leader Betty Friedan.

Videofreex

Women's Lib Rally

This video consists of raw footage from a Women’s Liberation Rally in New York City, shot on March 7th 1970, in celebration of International Women's Day. The first two thirds of the piece consist of footage of the crowd and speakers. Many issues are discussed including medical care, childcare, racial solidarity, Puerto Rican liberation, and imperialism. The final third of the tape includes interviews with male and female attendees of the rally.

Videofreex

Women's Lib Discussion: Burning Theatre and Alternate U

This video, shot in March 1970, contains raw footage from a Women’s Liberation event and discussion that took place in an art space. The tape begins with shots of the crowd mingling while music and speeches are heard in the background. Speakers address the audience, and the tape continues to record the discussion that follows. The main topics are abortion and contraception, and how they relate to power dynamics and the struggle for Women’s Liberation in general.

Branda Miller

Witness to the Future

An experimental documentary video project about individuals who have been transformed from so called “ordinary” citizens into activists, Witness To The Future seeks connections that unite people of all cultures, communities, races, and economic classes as they struggle for environmental and social change.

Vincent Carelli, Video in the Villages

Video in the Villages

An overview of the Video in the Villages Project, this documentary shows how four different Amazonian native groups (Nambiquara, Gavião, Tikina, and Kaiapó) have embraced video and incorporated it in the service of their projects for political and ethnic affirmation. Directed and photographed by Vincent Carelli.

Paul Chan

Tin Drum Trilogy

Paul Chan's Tin Drum Trilogy includes the highly acclaimed single channel videos RE:_THE OPERATION (2002, 27:30, U.S., color, sound), BAGHDAD IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER (2003, 51:00, U.S., color, sound), and Now promise now threat (2005, 33:00, U.S., color, sound).

In addition, this new DVD box set includes audio commentary by Paul Chan and VDB Director Abina Manning. An accompanying monograph includes title descriptions, artist's biography and newly commissioned contextualizing essays by Dierdre Boyle and Yates Mckee.

Paul Chan

Now promise now threat

“Now too late, he understood her. The heart that pumped out love, the mouth that spoke the Word, didn’t count.”

--Toni Morrison, “Beloved”

Art Jones

#FFFFFF

The third in a series of interactive CD-ROMs, #FFFFFF is a collage/essay, in several parts, about the reception aesthetics of pixels, and some other things. Included is a photo essay on the male body as used in advertising, an instructional guide on how to gain success as an artist, computer karaoke, and a video interview with DJ Spooky.

John Smith

Blight

"Blight was made in collaboration with composer Jocelyn Pook. It revolves around the building of the M11 Link Road in East London, which provoked a long and bitter campaign by local residents to protect their homes from demolition. Until 1994, when our houses were destroyed, both the composer and I lived on the route of this road. The images in the film are a selective record of some of the changes which occurred in the area over a two-year period, from the demolition of houses through to the start of motorway building work.

Activism

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