Workshop: Think Tank

Workshop: Think Tank

Anke Schäfer

We want more – Strategies and demands for women working in the film business
MODERATED BY ANKE SCHÄFER

Women film-makers, producers and festival networkers are cordially invited to come and develop strategies and demands aimed at generating higher levels of publicity, visibility and – not least –  funding for films made by women. The Think Tank will inspire us to think even the apparently impossible! We will pick up on themes from the forum entitled »You Cannot Be Serious – a Discussion on the Status of Women Directors« which took place during this year’s Berlin Film Festival at the initiative of the Dortmund | Cologne International Women’s Film Festival and the New York Athena Film Festival. The debate thus continues! Results and statements will be condensed in the form of a video trailer.

LaDoc – The Documentary Film Women’s Network in Cologne
Making a documentary film means developing ideas, filming with real people, allowing a highly distinctive film dramaturgy to evolve – and lending expression to a nuanced view of the world. To make professional documentary films, you also need to be familiar with the world of film production and the way TV companies and film promotion boards work. This overall environment demands of the film-makers a good deal of stickability and the readiness to accept risk and compromise. In the hope, then, of being able to act in unison and improve our own production conditions, around 25 freelance women authors, film editors and cinematographers meet up once a month to share their experience and exchange views – this since the autumn of 2003.

As varied as our films are – black & white or colour, celluloid or digital, still or shrill – what unites us is the documentary film and the realisation that working together makes better sense than  working against one another. Whether there is female view of reality or whether our working conditions are typical for women … well, we are not always agreed. But we do agree that we can learn  and benefit from one another and that together there is a much higher chance of getting the management teams and decision makers to listen to our arguments and demands. (ww.ladoc.de)

Anke Schäfer

Anke Schäfer is a systemic drama therapist and a member of the German Association of Drama Therapists. She is also a systemic film coach, a media artist and a film-maker. Further, she is a member of the documentary film networks LaDoc, based in Cologne, and of AG Dok, a nationwide organisation. She completed a diploma  as creative therapeutic mentor from 2008 to 2011 at the Institute for Drama Therapy in Berlin. In 2012, she enrolled for a further education course in script constellation at the Syst Institute in Munich. Ms Schäfer studied video and performance art with Nam June Paik and Nan Hoover at Düsseldorf Art Academy and completed a postgraduate study course in art at the Jan Van Eyck Academy in Maastricht. Exhibited worldwide, her works have been nominated for numerous awards including the Prix de Rome 1997 (NL). From 1995 to 2000, she was a visiting lecturer for media art, film and art history at the Maastricht Art Academy as well as at the Braunschweig Art Academy and the Enschede Art Academy (2000).