Wednesday 8 March, 4pm
Location: SODA Cinema
Event Type: In-person
Price: Free
Responsibility of representation – ethics of transcultural filmmaking practices
This session looks at the philosophy of representation in an intercultural context. Drawing on Deleuze’s ‘time image’ (Deleuze, 1985), and more contemporary interpretations by David Martin-Jones (Martin-Jones, 2019), Agata Lulkowska explores the responsibility of a documentary filmmaker when fixing in time a version of the interpretation of documentary contributors’ lives.
Drawing on Agata’s own filming experience with the Yanesha tribe in the Peruvian Amazon and the Arhuaco collective from Colombia, she explores the challenges of fixing identities in time in the times of fragmentarisation of reception practices.
Going further, she explores the conditioning of contemporary editing practices in the search for impartiality. With the illusion of capturing objective reality no longer possible, how can we deal with our positionality in the face of the subjectivity of choices embedded in the filmmaking process?
Drawing on intercultural examples of documentary filmmaking, this presentation explores the questions of who tells the story and controls the narrative and why. Grounded in Hall’s encoding-decoding paradigm (Hall, 1973) and Agata’s own film practice, she shares her filmmaking experience in Latin America and seeks to explore the nature of documentary filmmaking practices in intercultural contexts with the ethical challenges they bring.
About our Speaker
Agata Lulkowska is a Senior Lecturer in Film Production at Staffordshire University, and a founder of multiple events focused on creating support system for practice-based researchers. She was shortlisted for AHRC Research in Film Awards 2021 for her documentary The Voice of Sierra Nevada made with the Arhuaco community in Colombia. Coming from artistic backgrounds, Lulkowska written extensively about challenges of academic requirements when using creative practice as methodologies.
Founder of Rebellious Research Seminar Series and Director of Communities and Communication Conference and Festival, Lulkowska also co-host a Taming Your Inner Artist Podcast. Upcoming publications include Practice-based Research for Filmmakers, Routledge and Practice-based Research Book Series, Intellect. Co-director of C3 Research Centre Co- director, Lulkowska is a Managing Editor at the International Journal of Creative Media Research, editorial board member for Media Practice and Education, and a steering committee member for MeCCSA Practice Network.
She is also a former Artistic Director and Head of Programming at the Discovering Latin America Film Festival. Experienced Research Ethics Coordinator, and a steering member of the Diversity and Decolonisation Group with research interest in politics of representation and intercultural communication.
