The screening series “Framing Collective Action” presents artistic and documentary films created within collective structures. By linking historical and contemporary examples, the series explores the potentials of collective filmmaking through diverse aesthetic approaches. Each film program focuses on a specific spatial context (House, Street, Land) and examines the political and social impact of collective filmmaking both in front of and behind the camera, within and beyond the frame.
Time and again, the street serves as a stage for social struggle. While it is used every day as an infrastructural space, it is only through collective and physical occupation that it becomes a public arena where socio-political demands can be voiced. This is shown in the three short films selected for this program, entitled “Street”, which span different times and places—from 1983 to 2021, and from Georgetown to Kinshasa and Vienna. The films take varied approaches to dealing with the street, at times performative, documentary, theatrical, or activist. In doing so, they document actions that expose the lasting legacies of colonialism and anti-Semitism while also opening up possibilities for change.
With films by Artist group Schandwache, Collectif Faire-Part and Victor Jara Collective
Curated by Enar de Dios Rodríguez and Olena Newkryta
“In the Sky’s Wild Noise” by the Victor Jara Collective is built around an interview with Walter Rodney, the renowned Guyanese historian, author, and political activist who was assassinated in 1980. Interwoven with archival footage, the film examines the political, social, and economic conditions of the Guyanese working class during the 1970s.
On the eve of the postponed Congolese elections, two Congolese and two Belgian filmmakers set out to make a film about Kinshasa and its resistance to the legacies of colonialism. The result is “Faire-Part” by Collectif Faire-Part. Through the documentation of artistic performances in public space and a shared willingness to tell a story together—despite having grown up on different sides of history—, the film paints a provocative portrait of Kinshasa and its relationship with the rest of the world.
“Schandwache” by artist group Schandwache is a loose, fragmentary video documentation of the artistic interventions carried out at Vienna’s Karl Lueger Monument in 2020, which were initiated by the collective itself. The film brings together voices, images, and fragments of these public actions, offering a glimpse into a campaign that challenged the monument and called for a critical rethinking of how Austria commemorates its past.