Oska Bright Film Festival
Oska Bright: Better Safe.
DAO asked Oska Bright about the world's first national festival of short films made by and for people with learning disabilities
Following two successful festivals in Brighton in 2004 and 2005, and a national tour to over a dozen cities, Oska Bright reached over 10,000 people by the end of 2006 and showcased almost 100 films. Oska Bright will return to Brighton, even bigger and better than before, in October 2007.
Oska Bright is the only film festival in the world run by and for people with learning disabilities. The Festivals have attracted amazing feedback and support from people across the UK. The power of film has allowed people with learning disabilities to express their unique talents, allowing each one of their voices to be heard through creative drama, dance, music, animation and incredible sense of humour, touching their audience at all times. A truly remarkable achievement!
In addition to the screenings, the Festival also included an awards ceremony, with individual statuettes hand-made by committee member Andy Kee, and the awarding of two Oska Bright Film Training Bursaries, for two days training with Junk TV in film-making techniques. “We want to show that learning disabled people can do quality work”, says committee member Andy Kee.
In 2006-07 Oska Bright went On The Road, touring films from the 2005 festivals to over a dozen locations across the UK and Ireland, including London, Birmingham, Powys, Cardiff, Belfast, Exeter, Warrington and Wellingborough.
How it works
The most unique aspect of the Festival is that it is organised by a team of six learning disabled artists. With support from the learning disability arts organisation Carousel and community film makers Junk TV, they have regular meetings to decide on publicity, film selection and how to make the festival accessible - as well as event management.
“There are no other film festivals like this in the world”, says Richard West, Oska Bright committee member. “It is important that we are recognised as running the festival ourselves and that Oska Bright is judged as an arts event, rather than a disability event. There is a long way to go, but we want to be recognised by big film companies and other film-makers as artists in our own right and encourage them to take on our ideas and work with people with learning disabilities”.
The Autumn 2007 Oska Bright Film Festival will include training and new opportunities. The Festival will run from Monday 15 - Tuesday 16 October. It will also include various Master Class filmmaking workshops and an award ceremony. This will offer extended opportunities for learning disabled film makers to develop and extend their filmmaking skills through bursaries, networking and training. The awards ceremony will help to establish a benchmark of quality that encourages learning disabled film makers to expand their horizons and experiment with different film making techniques.
See www.carousel.org.uk for further information on both Oska Bright and Carousel's other activities.
last updated: 2007-05-08 18:19:30
tags : film festival learning disabilities