All-Call for Entries Into Asinabka Film and Media Arts Festival
Media submissions are being sought for inclusion in a new showcase, the Asinabka Film & Media Arts Festival, which will occur June 19–24 in Ottawa.
Organizers are looking for film and video submissions, media art submissions, and participants for a Sound Production Residency.
“Any film, video, or media work created by Canadian or international Indigenous artists, or that tells First Nations, Métis, or Inuit stories, is eligible,” say the organizers of the festival.
Film and video entrants can include documentary, drama, animation, experimental and other genres, and media art submissions can be installations, websites or art that is interactive, digital, conceptual or performance art. Click here for more information on submitting. Deadline is April 30.
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The Sound Production Residency, run during the length of the weeklong festival, is geared toward beginners and emerging artists alike. First Nations, Métis and Inuit youth between ages 18 and 30 are eligible to apply for the residency’s six spots. The program will teach them “one of the music industry’s top production/recording softwares,” according to the festival organizers. Travel, accommodations and entry into all Asinabka screenings and events are included.
"The Asinabka Festival aims to highlight works that examine indigenous issues and topics; to support media artists and filmmakers; to promote indigenous cultures and languages; to educate people about First Nations, Métis, and Inuit issues in Canada, and about indigenous issues internationally; to provide a space where Indigenous Peoples can tell their own stories and see their own cultures reflected back at them; and to entertain and be innovative," the festival website says.
The festival is the Algonquin name of the the sacred site that includes Victoria Island, Ontario, and Chaudière Falls, between Ottawa and Gatineau.
"The name Asinabka was chosen for this festival as an act of decolonization, and to reinforce that the Nations Capital is in the heart of the unsurrendered land of the Algonquins of the Ottawa River Valley," the festival's website says.
“The Chaudière Falls were especially significant—they took the shape of the bowl of a pipe, in this place of glare rock, Asinabka, and the rising vapours were a reflection of the fire and smoke of prayers rising to the Great Mystery," said the late Elder William Commanda, who walked on last August. His vision helped lead to the choice of this place for the festival, according to the website. More information is available here.
