NEWS

Luisa Rivi (2007) argued that in the last decades cinema turned into a privileged space for the examination of European identities. The shift to the ‘economy of signs’ (Lash and Urry 1993) reconfigured the ties of culture with economy. In the EU context, culture became a policy-oriented field (Shore 2006) supporting the processes of Europeanisation. At the same time, new borders transformed the European landscape and (re)drew the attention to south East Europe. The notion of ‘neighbourhood’ (Appadurai 1996) became significant both in the reconsideration of space in a more socially and culturally sensitive way and in the process of Europeanisation. In this framework, although co-productions were often defined as economic ventures, nowadays, they are considered a much more complex space of interwoven economic, cultural and political relations. This space often draws from past affinities, cross-border geographies, media policies, economic exigencies, political agendas as well as creative visions. [...]

Click to download the conference and the screening programmes.

The Study Day, under the title “Greece in the Cinematic Turmoil. In Search of the Political Gaze in Times of Crisis?”, is organised by Evgenia Giannouri (Paris 3, IRCAV), Mélisande Leventopoulos (Paris 8, ESTCA) and Achilleas Papakonstantis (University of Lausanne). It focuses on contemporary Greek films and their regard to issues of politics. Despite the country’s current situation of economic precariousness and social unrest, the Greek political film seems to constitute an impossible genre. Yet, it used to be a major part of the New Greek Cinema of the 1970s and 1980s, whereas it represents one of the most prevalent expressions in the field of documentary. [...]

International Conference “Balkan Cinema on the Crossroads: From Nitrate to Digital”, organised by Faculty of Dramatic Arts, takes place from 11^th to 13^th of June, 2017 in Belgrade, Serbia in Yugoslav Cinematheque during Nitrate Film Festival .

The conference is organized with the support of: Ministry of Culture and Information of Republic of Serbia; Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development of Republic of Serbia; Secretariat for Culture, City of Belgrade; Yugoslav Cinematheque; Film Centre Serbia and Filmkultura.

50 scholars and researchers from 17 countries (Netherlands, Romania, Serbia, UK, Greece, Austria, Hungary, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Italy, Spain, Croatia, Turkey, Germany, USA, FYROM, Bulgaria) explore the trajectory of Balkan cinema from the early nitrate days to the contemporary digital era, by highlighting connections, similarities and comparable patterns across the cinemas of the region. As keynote speakers papers will present Giovanna Fossati, Professor of Film Heritage and Digital Film Culture at the University of Amsterdam and the Chief Curator of EYE Filmmuseum; and Dr Lydia Papadimitriou, Liverpool John Moores University. [...]

After the meetings in London (2013) and Seattle (2015), the 3^rd Conference on Contemporary Greek Film Cultures addresses the diverse aesthetic, historical, medial, and theoretical connections between moving images and all possible aspects of the ‘documentary.’ In light of the many facets of this key term, the conference does not confine itself to practices or traditions of documentary cinema in Greece. It rather explores the multiple cinematic acts and modes of registering, representing, evidencing, authenticating, certifying, and instructing; it discusses the indexical nature of photography and the digital image, the factual as well as fictional functions of audio-visual recording, the archival status of documentary film in Greece, its ideologies, deceptions, and omissions, the filmic depiction of documentation processes, the documents presented on-screen or lost in the Mediterranean Sea. This thematic focus responds to three interrelated circumstances: [...]

How has the ‘Greek crisis’ mediated the ways in which Greeks conceive of, negotiate and perform their history – however ancient or recent?

The ‘outbreak’ of the financial and socio-political crisis in Greece in 2008 has been interpreted as the end of the Metapolitefsi period that began with the collapse of the military dictatorship in July 1974. The rise of the neo-Nazi organisation Golden Dawn has been accompanied by an upswing in discourses and politics of racial eugenics, and a revived use (and, most ominously, the exploitation) of the national traumas of the Civil War to articulate political polarizations and civil strife in Greece. Meanwhile, as the death toll of the humanitarian refugee crisis in the Aegean mounts every day, memories of Greek expatriation and of the Asia Minor population exchange are invoked under the slogan “We are all Refugees”. In light of the growth and increased visibility of Muslim communities in Greece, the SYRIZA government promises to build the first mosque in Athens any day now (despite the protestations of the heads of the Greek Orthodox Church). In the meantime, Athens remains the only EU capital without an official place of worship for followers of the Islamic faith. [...]

‘The realm of the dead is as extensive as the storage and transmission capabilities of a given culture,’ writes the German media theorist Friedrich Kittler in Gramophone, Film, Typewriter (originally published in 1986). The emergence since the 1970s of electronic and knowledge-based technologies, and more specifically of digital media, has brought to the fore the close link that exists between media, knowledge, and perception, a link generating both exhilaration and anxiety. The centrality of media, however, to epistemological debates around the ways in which knowledge is produced, stored, and disseminated has a long history in Western thought. Under the banners of media history, media archaeology, and cultural transmission, important work has been undertaken in recent years on the history of media since the Renaissance and on persistent tropes in media discourse that make it possible to set current debates about digital media in a broader historical and theoretical context. One of the most complex and multifaceted case studies in the history of media in the West yet to receive systematic examination has to do with the arts of ancient Greece and Rome. What is the role of media (new and old, material and spiritual, perceptible and imperceptible) in the formation and reproduction of Greco-Roman arts and more broadly in what might be called the transmission of ‘classical’ culture? [...]

After the successful realisation of the second Contemporary Greek Film Cultures international conference at the University of Washington, Seattle, 8-9 May 2015, we call for expressions of interest in hosting the next Contemporary Greek Film Cultures conference in 2017/8 in your institution. We would like to hear from any of you who wish to undertake the task of organising the third such meeting for Greek Film Studies research.

The event is on its way to becoming the Standing Conference of Greek Film Studies, bringing together the international community of Greek film scholars to share and discuss new research in the field every 2-3 years at a different location each time. In addition, every such event is to be followed by a publication of selected papers from the conference, expanding and enriching the bibliographical corpus of Greek Film Studies internationally. [...]

As in any nation, debates about history have occupied a central place in the Greek public sphere where authors, artists and intellectuals have played a prominent role in shaping narratives about the past. Much has been said and written about the specific meaning of history in Greece given the fact that the country’s acclaimed ancient history, both Classical and Christian, is considered not only national history but also the foundational history of the entire Western world.

Have these circumstances led to a particular sensitivity in Greek culture vis-à-vis narratives about the past, or have they rather created a numbness and unwillingness to engage critically with such narratives? What do fictionalized accounts of the past tell us about Greek historical consciousness? This workshop aims to bring together scholars who are engaged in mapping and discussing Greek history and culture as it is expressed in contemporary literature, film and other narrative genres. [...]

Το διεθνές συνέδριο για τον πρώιμο κινηματογράφο (1896-1940) στην ευρύτερη περιοχή των Βαλκανίων και της Ανατολικής Μεσογείου – που πραγματοποιείται με την ευγενική χορηγία του Κοινωφελούς Ιδρύματος Ιωάννη Σ. Λάτση και του πλωτού μουσείου Νεράιδα – αποτελεί την πρώτη απόπειρα να βρεθούν μαζί και να συζητήσουν σε ακαδημαϊκό επίπεδο επιστήμονες και ερευνητές που εξειδικεύονται σε ζητήματα του βωβού και του πρώιμου ηχητικού κινηματογράφου εκτός των κυρίαρχων κινηματογραφιών της Ευρώπης και του Χόλλυγουντ.

Η συγκεκριμένη γεωπολιτική οριοθέτηση επιτρέπει να εξετασθούν ομοιότητες και διαφορές στην εμφάνιση και την εξέλιξη του κινηματογράφου σε μια μεταβατική περίοδο, η οποία χαρακτηρίζεται από την παρακμή και την κατάρρευση της Οθωμανικής αυτοκρατορίας, τις πτυχές της νεωτερικής όσμωσης με την ανάδυση των εθνικών κρατών, αλλά και την ιμπεριαλιστική και αποικιακή επέμβαση. Η διαμόρφωση των εθνικών κινηματογραφιών, οι τρόποι παραγωγής και κατανάλωσης του κινηματογραφικού προϊόντος καθώς και η αλληλεπίδραση στο έργο των πρωτοπόρων κινηματογραφιστών, όπως των αδελφών Μανάκια, αποτελούν βασικά θέματα που θα θίξουν ερευνητές από πανεπιστήμια της περιοχής, αλλά και από την υπόλοιπη Ευρώπη και τη Βόρεια Αμερική. [...]