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This article presents an interview with Ben Gibson, former distributor, programmer, film journalist and producer, who went on to run the London Film School from 2000 to 2014. In this interview, Gibson deconstructs what is meant by the term ‘independent film-making’ in an educational context. Drawing on his wealth of experience in a variety of contexts, Gibson takes apart current notions that dominate in contemporary educational and industrial discourses, surprisingly arriving at a conclusion which could lead emerging film-makers and their supporters towards a notion of independence after all.

This article presents an interview with Ben Gibson, former distributor, programmer, film journalist and producer, who went on to run the London Film School from 2000 to 2014. In this interview, Gibson deconstructs what is meant by the term 'independent film-making' in an educational context. Drawing on his wealth of experience in a variety of contexts, Gibson takes apart current notions that dominate in contemporary educational and industrial discourses, surprisingly arriving at a conclusion which could lead emerging film-makers and their supporters towards a notion of independence after all. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research started as an effort to recover lost childhood memories. I (Emilio Bassail) used the film-making apparatus as a device that allowed me to excavate, elaborate and produce representations based on the small fragments of memory I had left. After creating an archive of reconstructed memories, I started questioning the images I had unearthed. This position allowed me to interrogate and challenge the discourses behind the images. What I discovered is that forgetfulness was in fact an effect of the suppression of potentially subversive discourses. I had not really forgotten, but rather I had chosen not to remember (since the hidden childhood memories defied the internalised discourses of power and structure). To be able to remember and therefore to create, first I had to debilitate the discourses of the power structures that prevented me from going forward in my research. Following Suely Rolnik’s (2019)

This research started as an effort to recover lost childhood memories. I (Emilio Bassail) used the film-making apparatus as a device that allowed me to excavate, elaborate and produce representations based on the small fragments of memory I had left. After creating an archive of reconstructed memories, I started questioning the images I had unearthed. This position allowed me to interrogate and challenge the discourses behind the images. What I discovered is that forgetfulness was in fact an effect of the suppression of potentially subversive discourses. I had not really forgotten, but rather I had chosen not to remember (since the hidden childhood memories defied the internalised discourses of power and structure). To be able to remember and therefore to create, first I had to debilitate the discourses of the power structures that prevented me from going forward in my research. Following Suely Rolnik's (2019) proposal for a decolonisation of the unconscious, and expanding on my own work, this research is an exploration of film-making as a device to remember and to produce desiring/creative subjectivities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article – initially published in Spanish by Toma Uno in 2012 – explores the Catalonian project Cinema en curs, an annual, recurring and now international programme of film education that takes place with students aged 10–18 in schools and colleges. First detailing both the rationale and methodology motivating the project, the article goes on to discuss core aspects of the approach of Cinema en curs: the Lumière minutes exercise and the short films which serve as the culmination of students’ work on the project. In doing so, the article also explores the value of approaches to film education that help learners develop an appreciation of their own lived experiences and the places in which they live. A new introduction from the authors places the article’s discussion of Cinema en curs in a contemporary context.