Where in our public lives today do we have space for debate and discourse? Or the time to collectively work at creating meaning? Increasingly efforts to form opinions through debate is falling by the way side and public opinions is sought to be gathered by restricting citizens to choose between the narrow binaries of yes or no. And yet the media output today is truly phenomenal both in its speed and volume. News from around the globe reaches us within minutes; Internet has reduced this time span even further and even the audience eager for the latest Hollywood offering has to no longer wait months for the newer releases.

Nevertheless, in the present times itself many stories, people and histories are becoming more and more invisible. What becomes visible then tends to make many more invisible. The film festival Persistence Resistance 2009: a festival of contemporary political films aims to address this growing invisibility of plural narratives, concerns, stories and people from the public domain by bringing ‘other’ pictures into limelight. Organised by Magic Lantern Foundation (MLF), a media arts and human rights group, in collaboration with the India International Centre (IIC), Persistence Resistance 2009 will be held from 17-19 April in New Delhi.

In its second edition the festival will screen nearly 200 films from India and the world. This edition also brings a special focus on South Asia by bringing films and directors to explore together the simultaneous nature of the composite and the fragmented cultures of the subcontinent.

Films will be screened in auditoria, in the outdoors, in simulated video parlours, at a multi-hub video library, and as installations.

Daily seminars will engage with aesthetics and politics of the documentary form.

Evening presentations will explore the linkages between the art of filmmaking and the other arts.

Entire bodies of work of a few filmmakers will be available for viewing together, chronologically and sequentially.

Film Festival: PERSISTENCE-RESISTANCE: a festival of contemporary political films

Date: 17-19 APRIL 2009

Venue: India International Centre, 40 Max Mueller Marg, Lodi Estate, New Delhi

Time: 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.

Entry Free

PERSISTENCE RESISTANCE FESTIVAL SCHEDULE