Millions of Americans have seen Rollen Frederick Stewart, a.k.a. “Rainbow Man”, who achieved notoriety during the late 70's by appearing in the crowd at thousands of televised sporting events wearing his trademark rainbow-colored afro wig. Later -after he became a born-again Christian- he added a sign reading “John 3:16”. Over the years, grabbing the attention of the media became an obsession for Stewart. He abandoned his home and marriage to roam the country living out of his car, studying TV Guide each week in a never-ending quest to stay televised...

The Purple Meridians III

The Purple Meridians III

Over the past two years, a total of 19 filmmakers based in the three countries have met, online and in person, to discuss obstacles they face as women and non-binary people in the audiovisual industry, to exchange ideas and resources, and to create together.

Preparations are underway in Italy , Turkey , Catalonia and the Basque Country for the third edition of The Purple Meridians 2023 , with the Gender Equality sponsorship by Eurimages .

This year, the project will have its public and main event at the Durango Book-Music-Cinema Fair on 7 December . Durango is a city in the Basque Country and has been chosen by the organizers of The Purple Meridians to expand even further – as is the purpose of this project – the connections among women filmmakers in Europe and beyond.

The choice of the Basque Country was therefore a ‘natural’ development as Basque filmmakers followed the first two Purple Meridians albeit ‘from a distance’. The program in the Basque Country will be possible thanks to the collaboration with the Durango Book Fair and Suargi Elkartea.

Two main themes would be the focus of this third event:

the difficulties, responses, proposals for women in the audiovisual industry to conjugate work and care work (maternity, care of children, care of elderly, care of ill partner/family member etc) and for women with disabilities.

These two themes will be discussed in a 2-session conference in Durango to be held on 7 December 2023.

Two filmmakers directly and most affected by this situation will be leading the discussion, Lisa Çalan and Ahu Ozturk . The two filmmakers, both Kurdish, will work with Basque filmmakers (who are exploring these issues in their films and who this year will be presenting a manifesto about ‘care’), as well as with the other filmmakers of The Purple Meridians (from Italy and Catalonia), not only in exposing the problems, but also in proposing answers, keeping in mind that one of the pillars of The Purple Meridians project is creating networks among women filmmakers in different countries.

The speakers will be:

Lisa Çalan, Ahu Öztürk (from Turkey, TPM), internationally acclaimed Basque actress Itziar Ituño (La Casa de Papel), Basque directors Ainhoa Olaso (winner of the Aukera program) and Estibaliz Urresola (awarded in Berlin 2023), Catalan director Lara Vilanova (TPM), Italian director Claudia Tosi (TPM), Argentine scriptwriter based in Belfast Luciana de Mello , Lebanese director Mary Jirmanus Saba , Kurdish director Sevinaz Evdike (Women Filmmakers Collective Kezi), and director Elli (Post Collective - Buriatia, Greece, Syria, Belgium).

The day will be accompanied by the screening at Irudienea (12:30h-13:30h) of Estibaliz Urresola's short film, Cuerdas , and a Work in Progress by Mary Jirmanus Saba.

At 19:00 h, the filmmakers will present to the press a summary of the conference's work.

The press conference will feature also an intervention by a Palestinian filmmaker.

The Purple Meridians II

Conversation with Lisa Çalan

Screening at Truffaut Cinema

The Purple Meridians II

Three organisations in cities and countries that are far away from each other, but share the desire for a fairer distribution of opportunities for women and non-binary people in the audiovisual and film industry.

Over the past year, three workshops were held in which 18 film and video makers discussed and shared their experiences and knowledge.

The workshops gave rise to several proposals, including the desire to continue to cultivate these connections, and to organise a face-to-face meeting in which to further develop individual needs and strengthen personal and professional links.

In 2022, we organized a thematic residence at Faberllull Olot to keep working on the proposals that emerged in the 2021 workshops: an international meeting of 10 filmmakers from different countries, to break the boundaries they have faced and contribute proposals for moving forward.

The idea is to create a network for mutual support and exchange for future collaborations, along an axis that crosses the whole of Europe, from its eastern to its western border.

http://purplemeridians.org/

http://purplemeridians.org/

The public presentation

The Purple Meridians is a joint project by three organisations in Spain, Italy and Turkey that brings together eighteen women filmmakers, six from each country, to debate the difficulties faced by women working in the filmmaking industry and wider screen sector. The aim is to share strategies for overcoming common obstacles and set up a support and exchange network for future partnerships crisscrossing Europe from east to west.

The project is made up of three workshops, an online roundtable, onsite screenings in Barcelona, Turin and Diyarbakır and an online programme featuring a selection of films by the participating filmmakers. The films, subtitled in English, will be made available on the streen.org platform, free of charge on the first day (to be decided on the basis of the onsite screenings) and then on a pay-per-view basis for three months.

Once the onsite and online workshops have been held in Barcelona, Turin and Diyarbakır,  each group will watch the videos of the workshops held by the other two groups and draw up a set of conclusions to share at the online international roundtable.

The filmmakers resident in Catalonia ( Anna Giralt Gris, Raquel Marques, Pilar Monsell , Ro Caminal, Lara Vilanova i Lili Marsans) will meet at the Centre Cívic Pati Llimona , where they will connect with Turin (as part of the Torino Film Festival) and Diyarbakır (Turkey).

OVNI, Mostra de Films de Dones i l’Alternativa will present a programme of films made up of two films by each of the eighteen participating filmmakers.

The remaining shorts will be screened on the same day on a continuous loop on a monitor at the Pati Llimona Civic Centre.

All the films will be available from 3 December in their original language with English subtitles on purplemeridians.org .

1- Spain Workshop (onsite)

     Monday 15 November , 4 pm to 8 pm

    Sala Raval, CCCB, Not open to the public

2- Spain Workshop (online)

    Monday 22 November , Not open to the public

3- International Roundtable (online)

    Saturday 27 November, 11 am to 12.30 pm

    Open to the public, The roundtable will be held in English

4- The Purple Meridians Screenings

    Thursday 2 December , 6.30 pm to 8.30 pm

    Centre Cívic Pati Llimona, Free admission

    Films in their original language with Catalan subtitles

The Purple Meridians is a joint project by three organisations in Spain, Italy and Turkey with the support of 2021 Eurimages Gender Equality Sponsorship.

http://purplemeridians.org/

http://purplemeridians.org/

The meta-fiction is as follows: in a second Mexican/American war, Mexico wins. The USA collapses and the former states fragment into a myriad of micro-republics controlled by a multiracial junta led by the Prime Minister Gran Vato. Spanglish is the official language. The anglo militias desperately attempt to re-establish the old order. 6th Independent Vídeo & Interactive Phenomena Show

Acclaimed German filmmaker Alexander Kluge, one of the most relentlessly innovative and intellectual figures in contemporary German cinema/ has in recent years produced a remarkable series of works for television. Produced for the German television program "Ten to Eleven" this series comprises an extraordinarily rich body of work that compliments and dialogues with Kluge's films. Traversing realms of desire and culture in the 19th and 20th centuries, these highly experimental works weave together eclectic scenarios that reference advertising, cinema, opera, and electronic communications, and culminate in an ironic critical discourse on fantasy, representation, and history.

The Gladiators is a bleak satire set in the near future, in which the major powers of the world, East and West, aligned and non-aligned, recognize the possibility of a major world war within our lifetime and try to forestall it by channelling man’s aggressive instincts in a more controllable manner. They do this by forming an International Commission along the lines of the United Nations, dedicated to fighting a series of contests between teams of selected soldiers from each country. These competitions, which can be fought to the death, are called “Peace Games”, and are broadcast on global television via satellite - complete with sponsors and commercials. The film follows Game 256... The international group of officers watching Game 256 decide to eliminate a man and a woman from opposing teams who reach out to each other, because they decide that such forms of communication would be the gravest threat of all to the stability of the existing world-system.