Colombia. Films, radio and television programmes, and audio and video recordings are listed by the United Nations as the heritage of all, containing key information from the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, forming part of our history and cultural identity.
This led UNESCO to approve in 2005 the celebration of World Heritage Day every 27 October. In Colombia, part of the responsibility for preserving this type of material is carried out by the Colombian Film Heritage Foundation, an entity that throughout its history has achieved the rescue and restoration of many of these pieces.
Its director, Alexandra Falla, commented that the heritage foundation has about 200,000 restored units of different formats and that the great challenge is to make that memory visible, "Memory when it connects with people, has like a rebirth, all those audiovisual materials that many do not know, achieve a renaissance in an exhibition, such as the one we are doing in the Active Memory Cycle commemorating the 30 years of the Foundation. Doing this is like a new life for that material, for the filmmakers, for everyone."
The month that ends connects with the theme of restoration by celebrating the XIII National Meeting of Audiovisual Archives, organized by the Directorate of Cinematography of the Ministry of Culture, Colombian Film Heritage Foundation, General Archive of the Nation, National Radio Television of Colombia, Señal Memoria, the Luis Ángel Arango Library and the Library Network of the Bank of the Republic.
All met from October 24 to 28 and the opening of the meeting was held in the Auditorium of the Art Museum of the Bank of the Republic, where the documentary "Albums of memory and visual narratives, UP GALLERY", by Luisa Santamaría, was screened, which narrates the process of creating the photographic albums made as part of a photo-documentary project with widows and daughters of some leaders of the Patriotic Union party, murdered during the 80s in Colombia.
As part of the Active Memory Cycle organized by the Colombian Film Heritage Foundation, with the support of the Augustinian University and the production of Cinema Luna, the film Tiempo de Morir was screened, its protagonist Sebastián Ospina, who accompanied the outdoor screening made in the Foundation's parking lot and was surprised to see the quality with which the film is preserved and restored. He said "I can't believe how this movie looks, it looks amazing how it looks."
Alexandra Falla stressed that "In Colombia, cinema gives an account of our history because finally through fiction films there are many things that we can analyze in each film, which are not necessarily historical films, but they are films that are part of a historical moment, that are part of a social reality. I imagine, for example, how can all the material made by Víctor Gaviria be analyzed in thirty years?"
October was not only sweets and costumes, it is a month that frames very important celebrations such as the World Day of Audiovisual Heritage proclaimed by UNESCO, the 30 years of the Colombian Film Heritage Foundation, the 45 years of the District Cinematheque of Bogotá and the 30 years of the Caribbean Cinematheque Foundation.
It is the opportunity to participate in the collective construction of the Policy implemented by the Ministry of Culture in this area, through the drafting of the Bogotá Manifesto 2016, which aims to establish priorities and propose activities for the development of this subsector of Colombian culture. This mechanism was carried out on Friday 28 in the morning hours at the facilities of the District Cinematheque of Bogotá.
Text written by Luis Pinto, advisor of the magazine TVyVideo+Radio.
