*CFP* "CINEMA, AESTHETICS AND MEMORY", I INTERNATIONAL FILM STUDIES CONFERENCE

Cinema, Aesthetics and Memory: I International Film Studies Conference

2, 3 and 4 of June of 2021

University of Coimbra (Online)

 

Cinema is a privileged territory for aesthetic and discursive experimentation regarding memory, both in fiction and documentary film. The subjective turn underwent in the latter field over the last decades of the 20th century belongs to a wider cultural process, in which the contemporary interest in the past leads to a desire to rework the official narratives of history. This dynamic has been especially active in Latin America, among other territories, since documentary film has had a crucial role in constructing a collective memory about the military dictatorships that generated profound loss and trauma in different countries. Patricio Guzmán, the filmmaker honored by this conference, is one of the best-regarded documentarists in Latin-America, author of an extensive work on the social and political history of his country, Chile. 

In his latest trilogy, formed by Nostalgia for the Light (2010), The Pearl Button (2015) and The Cordillera of Dreams (2019), Guzmán creates a personal narrative on the inscription of individual, collective and historical memory in his country’s geography and landscape. Taking this filmmaker’s work as a starting point, we aim to reflect on the interplay between memory and aesthetics in film in order to develop different paths and languages:

• Can the aesthetic experience of immersion in the film landscape contribute and/or take an active part in the reconstruction of memory? 
• What power does film exercise when recalling contrasting memories, as both a vehicle of transmission and obliteration of events? In what ways does cinema clarify or contribute to expose or erase the past? 
• Has cinema any transformative power in the context of traumatic situations? 
• What are the main aesthetic, narrative and poetic strategies to create and represent memory through film?

 

Proposals can discuss the following topics, among others:

• cinema and memory; 
• landscape and memory; 
• film-essay: cinema and poetry; 
• politics of representation in contemporary documentary; 
• Patricio Guzmán’s films.

 

The working languages of the conference will be Portuguese, English and Spanish.

Please submit an abstract (200-500 words) and a brief bio (100 words) to filmconferencesubmissions@gmail.com by March 15, 2021. Submissions must be written in Times New Roman, size 12, 1,5 space paragraph.

Deadline: 15th of March of 2021