For World Peace Day on 21st September, films4peace, an annual, unique short film commission by PUMA, again explores the subject of peace via the medium of film. Now in its third year, the project is curated by Mark Coetzee, ex-Director of the Rubell Family Collection, supported by PUMA and produced by Shooting People. It features some of today’s most innovative contemporary artists all of whom are asked to visually interpret the subject of peace.
These short films are released annually, on World Peace Day, both physically at cultural and educational venues globally, and online via websites, blogs and media channels. The films are live screened at hundreds of cultural venues, from Human Rights Festivals to major museums public spaces, youth leadership conferences and new media centres, from Dakar, Senegal to Miami, USA to Kashmir, India - in 2012, screenings spanned across 23 countries.
Justin DeKoszmovszky, PUMAVision Program Manager, said: “We are proud to produce films4peace with Shooting People for the third year running. This year we commissioned seven fantastic artists to again explore and interpret the subject of peace Peace to catalyze discussion and action, starting -- but not ending -- on World Peace Day. At PUMA we believe that film can be a powerful medium for change that can enlighten, educate and engage individuals such as consumers, activists, investors, voters, employees and leaders on issues critical to all of us.”
This year, 7 acclaimed artists have been commissioned to create short films around the subject of peace: Rob Carter, Wilmer Wilson IV, Athi-Patra Ruga, Zanele Moholi, Anthony Goicolea, and Assume Vivid Astro Focus.
Zanele Moholi is a multi-award winning, highly provocative and exceedingly in demand South African photographer. Moholi’s work is mostly about increasing the visibility of gay and transgender culture in the black community and she has drawn considerable attention to the practice of “queericide” – people who are killed via gender related hate crimes.
Fellow South African Athi‐Patra Ruga is fast becoming an exciting rising star in performance art. Ruga himself dresses up in a spectacular array of costumes, inserting himself, or rather the characters he is playing, into challenging situations. He pulls together film, fashion and photography to make thought provoking, striking pieces relating to cultural identity as a hybrid construct.
23 year old Wilmer Wilson (Washington, USA) is a recent photography graduate whose card was marked when the prestigious Conner Contemporary gallery singled him out as one to watch and invited him to debut his challenging first collection. In creating ‘Domestic Exchange’ Wilson found his 3D voice to make live sculptures using every day objects with low cultural value to make poignant points around freedom, choice, race.
Over the past decade, New York based Cuban American Anthony Goicolea has gained a reputation as the consummate storyteller. Having created a significant body of work which has gained great acclaim and found its way into numerous galleries both locally and internationally, Goicolea’s multimedia works are enigmatic, mysterious, ambiguous, humorous, unsettling, and provocative.
Brooklyn-based Englishman Rob Carter has a knack for exposing landmarks and iconic structures from above while using his often comedic but always thoughtful knife (literally and figuratively) to create collages of the original material. Whether its placing the unofficial Church of England (the home of footballers Manchester United) in Canterbury Cathedral, the home of the actual Church of England or placing imagery literally among plants and documenting its growth, his work is thought provoking and engaging.
First initiated by Brazilian-born artist Eli Sudbrack in 1994 as a professional tag, assume vivid astro focus is now a continuously evolving international group of artists known for creating multi-sensational mash-ups of graffiti, disco worship, gay porn and carnival in the form of large-scale installations and performance art. They are included in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art, New York and the Judith Rothschild Foundation Contemporary Drawing Collection.
Films4peace celebrates World Peace Day - an international United Nations day of ceasefire, and a day for individuals, organizations and countries to demonstrate acts of peace. Each artist will visually interpret the subject of Peace to create a short film, which, in keeping with the spirit of the commission, will be gifted to the world, within public domain and free from screening fees, as tools for peace. By releasing these short films as broadly as possible, on multiple live and virtual platforms, the aim is to effect positive social change and broaden the discussions around peace globally.
The films include 35 mm live action, experimental animation and fine art approaches. The artists are selected for the quality and scope of their work and their sensitivity in interpreting the theme.
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