Associação Cultural Videobrasil

DVD bonus + about the artist + about the director Bonus In testimonies recorded in Beirut and São Paulo, curators and artists involved in the "Possible Narratives" show, exhibited at the 14th Videobrasil International Electronic Art Festival, speak on the themes that have influenced their production: the rapid physical reconstruction of a devastated nation, the relationship with a country that changes with each passing day, and the act of erasing the past. In addition to the curator Christine Tohme, other speakers include artists Ghassan Salhab, Marwan Rechmaoui, Jalal Toufic, Tony Chakar, and Walid Raad, the creator of The Atlas Group. The artist Born in Saida, on the southern coast of Lebanon, in 1966, Akram Zaatari spent his teenage years caught between the tension of the nation's civil war (1975-1990) and the normality of family life. He graduated in Architecture in Beirut and specialised in Media Studies at the New School for Social Research, in New York. He made his first incursions into art in the 1990s, subverting the original meanings of newspaper images in the poetic "Teach Me". Since then he has produced video, film, photography, installations, and text, a unique oeuvre, broaching such themes as sexuality, social roles, and memory. Cofounder of the Arab Image Foundation, an organization that recovers, studies, and produces art based on images from and of the Middle East, Zaatari has become an important promoter of the artistic production that has emerged in postwar Lebanon, bringing to light such names as Walid Raad, Marwan Rechmaoui, and Walid Sadek. Based in Beirut, Zaatari is nowadays recognised as much for his international curatorship as for his own work. For this year's International Short Film Festival Oberhausen, in Germany, for example, he has created a program entitled "Radical Closure", which brings together works of art produced in various situations of physical or ideological confinement - or in response to such confinement. The director Producer and independent director, Alex Gabassi was assistant director and stage manager at the London-based physical theatre company Theâtre de Complicité. He has produced installations and an exhibition of the work of American artist Bill Viola for the Videobrasil International Electronic Art Festival (1992). He has also directed series and specials for MTV Brasil and made music videos for Marisa Monte, Caetano Veloso, David Byrne, and Carlinhos Brown. Also in the Videobrasil Authors Collection series, he has directed the documentary "Certain Doubts of William Kentridge" (2000) and codirected "Rafael França: Work as Testament" (2001). He is the director of a documentary entitled "About a Name" (2001) and various advertising films.

Launches, exhibitions and archives - "Akram Zaatari: A Glimpse of One Man's Vision" launch: 2004_ - SESC Pompéia, São Paulo exhibitions: 2007_ - Videobrasil Coleção de Autores, IBRACO, Colombia 2006_ - Sole e Luna Doc Fest 2006, Palermo, Itália (PRIZE FOR THE BEST DOCUMENTARY ON EDITING) - Videobrasil on Tour 2006-2007 at Museu Victor Meirelles, Florianópolis - Videobrasil Authors Collection Retrospective, Unidade Provisória SESC Avenida Paulista, São Paulo - 1º Dockanema - Festival do Filme Documentário , Maputo, Moçambique - Arte e História em Documento, Centro Cultural Banco do Nordeste, Fortaleza - Arte em vídeo: a expressão por imagens em movimento, Videoteca PUC-SP, São Paulo - Shoot Me Film Festival, Den Haag, Holanda - VCA na Bahia, FUNCEB, Salvador - Videobrasil Colección de Autores, La Diferencia, Colombia 2005_ - Mostra de Vídeo no Programa (DV) Brasil, Belo Horizonte - Mostra de Vídeo no Programa (DV) Brasil, Porto Alegre - Mostra SESC Eletrônica Arte 2005, SESC Paraíba, João Pessoa - Le Plateau, Frac Ile-de-France, France - Video/economy – Distributions in Global Format, ZKM, Germany archives: - CCA - The Center for Contemporary Art archive, Tel Aviv, Israel - Hong Kong Arts Centre archive, Hong Kong - International Short Film Festival Oberhausen archive, Germany - Le Plateau media library, Frac Ile-de-France, France - Public schools libraries: EE Madre Paulina, EMEF Antônio Carlos de Andrada e Silva, EE Condessa Filomena Matarazzo, Centro Municipal de Educação Adamastor, Diretoria de Ensino Leste 1, Coordenadoria de Educação Ermelino Matarazzo, Coordenadoria de Educação de São Miguel/Jardim Helena, Coordenadoria de Educação de São Miguel/Vila Jacuí, Coordenadoria de Educação de São Miguel/São Miguel Paulista, São Paulo, Brazil