Project Detail

Mariam Jafri vs. Maryam Jafri

Synopsis

The starting point for this video piece is an image of artist Maryam Jafri's sculpture 'Anxiety', that has been turned into a stock photo for licensing on a major photographic agency's website without the artist's prior knowledge or permission.
A voiceover traces the work’s trajectory from a readymade sculpture for sale at an art fair to a stock photo for licensing online and finally, to a video commissioned by a Kunstahalle, a space meant to guarantee the autonomy of art. The work reflects upon the role of originality, artist labour and copyright in our culture of sampling and remixing.
Official Selection International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) 2020 -Bright Future

Details

Year
2020
Type of project
Shorts
Running time
12 min
Director
Maryam Jafri
Artist's Note
The video piece title references the caption accompanying the photograph which misspells my name. The title also references an earlier work I made in 2012, called GETTY VS GHANA which examined the unauthorized copyrighting of African independence day photographs by multinational stock photo agencies, including Getty Images and Corbis.

Production Status

Page updates

This page was last updated on 12th May 2025. Please let us know if we need to make any amendments or request edit access by clicking below.

See also

You may also be interested in other relevant projects in the database.

Mr. Nobody Against Putin Mr. Nobody Against Putin

Director: David Borenstein (director), Pavel Talankin (co-director)

Year: 2025

A Russian teacher secretly documents his small town school's transformation into a war recruitment center during the Ukraine invasion, revealing the ethical dilemmas educators face amid propaganda and militarization. Official Selection Sundance Film Festival 2025 - World premiere Official Selection CPH DOX 2025 Official Selection Sheffield DocFest 2025 BAFTA Awards 2026 - Winner - Best Documentary Academy Awards 2026 - Winner - Best Documentary Feature

Face, boy, eclipse A Season in Secret

Director: Matthew Berka

Year: 2027

A SEASON IN SECRET brings together material both close at hand and far away. It is a meditation on things glimpsed at a distance and the limits of perception. What lies behind the screen is hidden and may only be hinted at through the language of visible images and sounds. The film takes some of its cues from the Japanese aesthetic concept of Yūgen, described in part by the 15th-century aesthetician Zeami Motokiyo: “...to stand upon the shore and gaze after a boat that disappears behind distant islands.”

A Few Moments of Happiness (Quelques instants de bonheur) A Few Moments of Happiness (Quelques instants de bonheur)

Director: Shaden Safieddine Tazi

Year: 2026

A young Lebanese filmmaker in Paris watches Lebanon's war unfold on her phone from bed. In a state of paralysis, barely able to get out of bed, she calls her father everyday and begins recording her digital life. Using screen recordings, family voices, and silences, the film intimately portrays a generation witnessing their homeland's destruction remotely. Official Selection Venice International Film Festival 2026 - World premiere