Every Cinema/Texts is an attempt to broaden the dialogue around the political context of contemporary film practices through a feminist perspective. It highlights the distinction between ethics and aesthetics, and the perils in interpreting feminism and politics as genres and categories in lieu of practice. Whereas numerous pleas for gender equality have been made to film festivals – and a short attention wave was directed to films where female characters hold a central place – there is still the need to formulate new working terms and conditions, as well as to propose new, hybrid production, curatorial and educational models in the field. Every Cinema is a tool for investigating the potential of the moving image to become a practice of social organization, a feminist multidirectional transmission of experience, and a collective form of thought and action. It proposes a mode to produce personal and political experiences for the reconfiguration of the ecosystem of the moving image, as well as an introduction to feminist film practices; it aspires to contribute to the revision of the production framework and affect the choice of subject matter in future filmmaking. The publication’s methodology employs documentation and artistic expression as a means of autotheory, balancing between creative and deeply personal writing. Five authors and a film club researching the moving image make use of the written word to narrate personal stories about their bodies, motherhood, sexuality, creativity and collectivity.
TEXTS BY:
LINA BEMBE is a Berlin-based porn film performer, filmmaker and writer. She has appeared in a wide range of pornographic narratives, spanning from mainstream and feminist to DIY queer post-porn. Alongside porn, Lina writes and curates film programs about feminism, culture and sexuality. In her text titled “[Sheer] Representation Doesn’t Matter”, she describes her experience from a workshop that took place during Pornfilmfestival Berlin. This workshop brought together different BIPOC performers in order to analyse the issue of representation in the porn sector.
HILDA KAHRA was born in Sweden and mostly works on subject matters that pertain to issues of class and the historical dimensions of belonging. She is interested in slow creative processes. Hilda contributes with the text “WE’RE FLOATING”, which is dedicated to mothers, cinema and whales.
NIKOLETA LEOUSI was born in Athens and studied chemical engineering and film. Her films present narratives that combine storytelling with elements of political documentary film. Her text “Nights When the Numbers Don’t Add Up” is a poetic account of the way in which she understands motherhood in relation to filmmaking. Listing the late hours when she wakes up in the middle of the night, the rushes she shot during her nine-month pregnancy, and finally, taking a breath to keep on writing.
GELI MADEMLI studied journalism and film theory and is writing her dissertation on the notion of crisis in different manifestations of Greek film heritage. In her text titled “How Not to Lose One’s Marbles: Takes for the Virtual Life of the Moving Image”, she presents some personal narratives on film cultures, marbles, virtuality and the moving image. Narratives written on the foothill of the Acropolis rock or upon arrival at the Athens airport, examples of untranslatable texts, metaphors and metonymies, build an environment inhabited by vulnerable subjectivities.
SOFIA SECIN is a Mexico-based woman writer and literature teacher. Her experience in film production made her realise the complexity of being a woman in film – a topic she also negotiates through her writings and audiovisual projects. In her text titled “Work in Progress”, she describes her encounter with a woman who had recently become a mother and was planning to shoot a film about motherhood and pregnancy. Sofía collaborated with her in writing a funding proposal, she entered the everyday life of the family, and is now sharing her own perspective on motherhood.
UBUNTU FILM CLUB is a film club in Helsinki, founded in 2019 by Alice “Mutoni” Dusabe, Rewina Teklai, and Fiona Musanga. Their goal is to reveal and celebrate Black cinema and to create a community around it. The club has screened films in different venues around Helsinki, followed by conversations and panels. In this publication, we present a transcript of a group discussion during which they introduce themselves and present the club’s vision.
MUSIDORA: on the occasion of Every Cinema’s publication, we have digitised the first two issues of “Musidora”, the first Greek independent publication on women and film. The first issue was published in the summer of 1984 and the second in the winter of 1984–85. On the publication’s back cover, you can find the QR Code which will take you to the archived material.
PUBLICATION DATE 2021
PUBLISHING HOUSE Laboratory for the Urban Commons
LANGUAGE English, Greek
EDITED BY Danai Anagnostou, Pegy Zali, Xenia Kalpaktsoglou
AUTHORS Lina Bembe, Hilda Kahra, Nikoleta Leousi, Geli Mademli, Sofia Secín, Ubuntu Film Club, Mousidora
PROOFREAD Melina Tzamtzi, Joss Allen
DESIGN Vasileios Gkountinas
TRANSLATION Geli Mademli, Eleanna Papathanasiadi
PRINTING KEDA*PRESS
SUPPORTED BY Greek Ministry of Culture, The Foundation for Arts Initiatives
ISBN 978-618-85684-0-2