storytelling

Roland Legiardi-Laura, co-director of the award winning documentary To Be Heard, hailed by the New York Times as "One of the Best Documentaries of the Year," conducts a special master class for spoken-word artists and media makers to explore how the lyricism of poetry can fuel the narrative vision of video as well as media works for web based and transmedia platforms. Legiardi-Laura is as an artist who creates with words and images. He has championed a hybrid art form that extends the power of both. The event is free and open to the public.

To Be Heard screens in the Philadelphia Film Festival on Sunday, October 23, 12:30PM at the International House. MORE INFO

This workshop provides students with an introduction to the technical and aesthetic languages of video production. Shooting with Flip cameras and Zoom audio/video recorders and editing with Final Cut Pro, each student will produce a short piece investigating a subject of personal resonance and social relevance. Past subjects have included racial identity, young motherhood, and cultural segregation. Diverse formal approaches are encouraged, from traditional documentary to lyrical essay. An emphasis is placed on "new media" distribution via YouTube, blip.tv, and other websites.

Have you started your screenplay but are not sure how to proceed? Are you struggling to make your characters complex and believable? Not sure if the dialogue feels natural and organic to the plot and story? Will the pacing keep audiences engaged? Take this workshop with screenwriter/director Tanya Hamilton and get advanced instruction in story, plot, structure, pacing, dialogue, and character development. You will also develop critical reading and writing skills through close readings and thoughtful critiques of your own and fellow participants’ screenplays. Participants are encouraged to have at least the first act of their screenplay written.

Register by calling 215-222-4201 or online now and bring confirmation receipt on day of workshop. Thank you for registering.

Presented in partnership with Film at International House, Philadelphia Independent Film & Media Association (PIFVA), and the Film and Media Arts Department at Temple University; the Africana Studies and Cinema Studies at University of Pennsylvania and Reelblack members

Frequently basing a work on archival or found footage, Kevin Jerome Everson "resurrects the conditions, tasks, and gestures of a vital moment in time by repositioning them in the present through a variety of mediums such as photography, film, sculpture, artist books, and paintings."

Everson's films combine scripted and documentary moments with rich elements of formalism. His most recent films - shot in single eleven-minute takes on 16mm film - use light flares, over exposed film, and distorted sound to render visible the materiality of film stock and videotape.

Join us for this special presentation in which Everson discusses how he creates his works that document and reflect on the "gestures or tasks caused by certain conditions in the lives of working class African Americans." Everson will screen a selection of his recent short films. Films courtesy of the artist and Picture Palace Pictures.

Register for workshop now: