The Art, Ethics and Technology of Documentary Co-Creation

With the Open Documentary Lab and the MIT Program in Art, Culture, and Technology:

• Katerina Cizek, Documentary Director, National Film Board of Canada, and MIT Visiting Artist
• Andrew Lowenthal, Open Documentary Lab Fellow and Co-Founder of EngageMedia
• Mandy Rose, Associate Professor and Director of the Digital Cultures Research Centre, University of West England, Bristol UK
• Ethan Zuckerman, Director of the Center for Civic Media and principal research scientist at the MIT Media Lab

As new forms of media, networks and devices emerge throughout history, documentarians are always at the forefront of discovering how to tell stories with them. From the first newsreels, to the latest Virtual Reality installations, non-fiction creators are the first to introduce their audiences and users to novel ways of interacting, immersing and collaborating in new environments while interpreting reality. How can these new technologies change the documentary creator’s relationship to the “people formerly known as subjects”? How can new models of co-creation redefine not just the form of the story itself but the methods by which we create them? How can documentaries be made “with” people instead of “about” them? This panel examines the history and potential for documentarians to co-create with citizens, social scientists, technologists and performing artists, with the aim to both create artful meaning and foster concrete political action.