Festival archive

mobile navigation

interfilm 2020

PA 02 From Collective Memory to Personal History – Looking at Decolonization in Short Film


How do short films address the processing, reflection and significance of colonial history? How do filmmakers approach the artistic examination of colonial history, whose implications reach into the present day, when it comes to subject matter and aesthetics? Can their work simultaneously support the decolonisation of cognitive structures and viewing habits?

With Nadja Ofuatey-Alazard, Onyeka Igwe and Verena Melgarejo Weinandt. The discussion will be moderated by Juana Awad (artist, curator and currently coordinator of the working group "Decolonial Aesthetics" of the DFG Research Training Group "Knowledge of the Arts" at the UdK Berlin).


Nadja Ofuatey-Alazard
was born in the Black Forest and holds a degree in journalism. She is a cultural activist, curator, production manager, editor, presenter and filmmaker. Since October 2017 she has been working as project manager and co-director/artistic director at Each One Teach One (EOTO) e.V. in Berlin. Here she is a.o. responsible for the annual literature and art festival AFROLUTION.

Onyeka Igwe
is an artist and researcher working between cinema and installation, born and based in London, UK. In her non-fiction video work Onyeka uses dance, voice, archives, sound design and text to create structural ‘figure-of-eights’, a format that exposes a multiplicity of narratives. Her works have been shown at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, Dhaka Art Summit, Berlin Biennale, and the London, Rotterdam International, Essay and Smithsonian African American film festivals. She has exhibited at articule, Montreal, Trinity Square Video, Toronto, Jerwood Space, London and The Showroom, London. She was awarded the New Cinema Award at Berwick Film and Media Arts Festival 2019 and the 2020 Arts Foundation Fellowship Award for Experimental Film.

Verena Melgarejo Weinandt
is an artist, curator and scientist. Currently she works as a scientific research assistant at the Berlin University of the Arts in the graduate college "The Knowledge of the Arts". As artistic director she cooperates with District * School without Center in a workshop and exhibition project for the translation of Gloria Anzaldúas "Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza". Besides numerous lectures and workshops, she taught at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, the *foundationClass of the Weißensee Kunsthochschule Berlin and in the Master programme "Solo/Dance/Authorship" at the HZT of the University of Arts Berlin.


All events are free of charge and held in English. The events will take place online and the Zoom link is available by registration via interforum@interfilm.de.