How does one define “amateur”? Operating against, outside, or within institutions, crossing borders, gender divides, technological and social gaps; the figure of the amateur may be estranged from popular filmmaking circles, yet their active role in the circulation of film culture is undeniable.
On March 19th, a group of scholars workshopped many roles of the amateur through a variety of national, ideological, technological, Institutional, and gendered lenses in an effort to better understand this elusive figure and their creations.
Special thanks to Dr. Lee Grieveson (University College London) for moderating the event and to all those who participated. This workshop would not have been a success without the hard work of the organizing committee, and we salute their efforts!
Participants:
Dr. Lee Grieveson (UC London)
Andrea Mariani (Udine): Crisis and Sintropy of an Amateur Practice. Experimenting Film Technology under Fascism: the Cineguf (1934-1943)
Giuseppe Fidotta (Udine): The Amateur Propagandist
Enrique Fibla (Concordia): The bourgeois amateur and the emergence of film culture in Catalonia
Dr. Luca Caminati (Concordia)- Respondent
Irene Rozsa (Concordia): Towards a History of Cuban Amateur Cinema in the 1950s
Darien S. Nicolás (Concordia): Cuban diaspora travelogues: Mapping nostalgias in the age of video
Dr. Masha Salazkina (Concordia)- Respondent
Vivianne Saglier (Concordia): Professional Training for Human Rights’ Amateurs
Julia Huggins (Concordia): Lovers in a Digital Time: The Figure of the Amateur Videographer in 50 First Dates
Patrick Smith (Concordia): Between the viral and the political: the appropriation of radical amateur media in James Benning’s the war (2012)
Haidee Wasson (Concordia)- Respondent
-01.png)