Christine Finn is a journalist, archeologist and artist who was in Haiti at the same time as the HKKP’s children cinema in March 2010. You can read her article for Radio 4’s “From Our Own Correspondent” here.
We were put in touch by mutual friends and she brought her installation Leave Home, Stay in Haiti to the Cube in October. Her pictures, which were all taken on a mobile phone are often of people getting on with life after the earthquake, cooking, plaiting hair and cleaning.
Here are three videos shot in March by young artists from the Ti Moun Resistans group. Tele Geto is their project to document day to day life in the ghettoes of Port au Prince and share their experiences through the internet with the rest of the world.
The group initially formed during the December 2009 Ghetto Bienalle held in the thriving artistic community of Grand Rue which was organised by UK photographer and HKKP friend Leah Gordon. The equipment used by the group was sourced by another UK friend of HKKP – John Cussans… he tells the fascinating story behind the project in a podcast on London Fields Radio here.
The films have been shown in London in July as part of an artistic collaboration with young people from Morpeth school in London’s East End
There’s a long article with lots of great pictures on the Haiti Kid’s Kino project in the July/August issue of The Big Picture Magazine . Big Picture is a free magazine you can find at independent cinemas, or you can download the article in the online issue here. .
Many thanks to editor Gabriel Solomons
This week it’s six months since the earthquake of 12th January 2010, when 300,000 people died and one and a half million people were made homeless.
Here’s one radio and one video piece recommended by readers of this blog, Ali and Aaron, that ask relevant questions like…
– Why with thousands of foreign NGOs in the country was Haiti a continuously failing state even before the earthquake?
– Six months after the earthquake, why has only 10% of the money promised by international donor governments reached Haiti?
Democracy Now! video piece http://www.democracynow.org/2010/7/12/democracy_now_in_port_au_prince
This American Life, radio article http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/408/island-time
Interviews with audience members at HKKP film night at Tapis Vert camp in Cite Soleil, Port au Prince. April 2010.
Get down! … in Cite Soleil Given that we’re currently the coolest children’s mobile cinema on the planet it’s not surprising that we have some of the funkiest dancers in the world in our audience – as you can see here…TURN IT UP!
playlist:
daytime – 300% Dynamite, Souljazz reggae compilation
evening – Youssou N’Dour’s theme song to Kirikou et La Sorciere
At the moment we’re doing two nights of screenings in Cite Soleil. It’s not the safest neightbourhood of Port au Prince but we’re in good company as we’re at a small camp at L’Athletique d’Haitistyle, a sports club set up by activist and all round star Bobby Duval to give local kids somewhere positive to focus their energy.
As always we’ve found the audiences in the hardest hit communities are some of the most appreciative film fans and most fun to hang out with …
On Saturday we did a joint show with Kid’s Kino friends Thomas, Luxon and Stanley from the Haitian comedy company Les Rescapes (The Survivors). Both Stanley and Luxon are living in camps in Delmar – not so far from tonight’s gig.
Les Rescapes perform silent slapstick and farce influenced by Charlie Chaplin, Mr. Bean and Benny Hill. They did a ten minute sketch before the screening and then we showed three of the their short films between the other films of the evening…
LES RESCAPES ET LE BABY SITTER
envoyé par digiprod. – Cliquez pour voir plus de vidéos marrantes.
At the moment they’re working on new material based around the earthquake, which will be amazing… we’ll feature it on the blog when it comes out. The screening was in the grounds of the Belgian Consulate – there’s a camp there on what was formerly the tennis courts, about 800 people are living there and in the adjoining area. The consul’s mother, the irrepressible Madame Francoise has been running children’s play schools there every day. During the two afternoons we were there we did video workshops with some of the children – you can see a couple of clips in the posting below…
* the survivors have lost everything … except their sense of humour
Emanuelle Daylais, 8
Simon Zanetty, 11
