Culture matters: Scottish-Libyan filmmaking collaboration

One of the great pleasures of working in Switzerland is the opportunity to meet and talk with creative people who mix and mingle at this international cultural crossroads.  It is an extra privilege that so many of these talented individuals come from the UK. This week I have been able to see some of the fruits of their work in the canton of Ticino in the Italian speaking part of Switzerland during the Locarno Film Festival.

The Locarno Film Festival has been held in that beautiful lakeside town since 1946. The Festival’s Open Doors initiative helps directors and producers from countries where independent filmmaking is vulnerable. In 2015 the focus is on four countries from the Maghreb (Algeria, Libya, Morocco, and Tunisia).

I was pleased to find that the Scottish Documentary Institute and the British Council played an important part in bringing out some of the Libyan stories. In 2012, just three months after the death of Gaddafi, the British Council invited the Scottish Documentary Institute to Libya, to run workshops with young local filmmakers. Many of these young people had been filming during the Libyan revolution and already had a lot of practical experience. According to Noe Mendelle, director of the Scottish Documentary Institute, the workshop focused on different imaginative ways to capture the views of ordinary people and the important things they have to say.

Despite the deteriorating political situation in Libya, the Scottish Documentary Institute returned to Tripoli in 2013 and 2014 to deliver further workshops. The result of the three year collaboration is a collection of 15 short films stories that give insights into people’s lives, trying to find normality in a world in chaos. Three of the young Libyan filmmakers were able to travel to Locarno and present their work to the audience there. Their presence reiterates how much culture matters in a world of political unrest.