Our Mission
Ethnographic cinema is a well-known discipline within academia, especially among anthropologists. However, the uninitiated often consider it an opaque, inaccessible, even elitist art.
Since 2003, FIFEQ-MTL’s mission has been to democratize visual anthropology and ethnographic cinema through programs featuring eclectic and accessible films. We also develop bridges between different fields: academic, cultural and associative.
One of the specificities of our festival is that our screenings, which we hold in professional cinemas such as the Cinéma Moderne, the Cinémathèque Québécoise, the Cinéma Public, the Cinéma du Parc and the Concordia cinema rooms, are free. We want all citizens to have access to cinemas to watch the films that we program on big screens and in rooms equipped with high-quality audio visual equipment.
FIFEQ-MTL brings together several hundreds of spectators every year around two common passions: visual anthropology and cinema. Through discussions between members of the public, filmmakers, researchers in the human sciences, and experts, we raise public awareness of ethnographic film and visual anthropology, as well as contemporary issues or experiences of filming and representing reality. In addition, we give priority to Indigenous, Canadian, Quebecois and non-Western film productions.
FIFEQ IN 4 KEY DATES
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2003
FESTIVAL FOUNDATION
A few years later, the FFEM extends to the two other Montreal universities with an anthropology department: McGill and Concordia. It then becomes the FIFEM: Festival Interuniversitaire du Film Ethnographique de Montréal.
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2005
THE FESTIVAL TAKES EXPANSION
A few years later, the FFEM spreads to two other universities in Montreal with anthropology departments: McGill University and Concordia University. It becomes the FIFEM: Ethnographic Film Inter-University Festival of Montreal.
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2007
FIFEM becomes FIFEQ
The Festival is getting structured. Very quickly, in Montreal, Quebec, and internationally, the event gains notoriety. Université Laval of Québec city joins the movement, FIFEM becomes FIFEQ!
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2018
FIFEQ-MTL shines outside of universities
For the first time, non-student volunteers join the festival team and are entrusted with the festival’s general coordination. FIFEQ-MTL then goes beyond universities to reach the general public. The festival settles in cinemas, museums and alternative institutions, meeting an increasingly diverse audience.
Since 2003
movies
spectators
volunteers
Our Project
The only festival of its kind in Canada, FIFEQ-MTL aims to carve out a place in the cultural sphere of Montreal, Quebec and Canada to ethnographic film, a cinematographic genre still little known. FIFEQ-MTL wishes to become a festival of reference for auteur ethnographic cinema in North America and internationally.
Since its beginnings, FIFEQ-MTL has wanted to break with colonial, essentialist, racist and dehumanizing schemes inherited from the colonial anthropology of the first half of the 20th century. The festival tends to democratize independent ethnographic cinema for the general public. It promotes a contemporary vision, and questions the ethics of visual captation, particularly in contexts marked by historical relations of domination. The FIFEQ-MTL team wishes to feature innovative and daring films that confront our representations of reality and push the limits of this discipline. At FIFEQ-MTL, ethnographic films are not just a question of otherness, voyeurism or exoticism: through its varied programming, the festival seeks to think critically of a filmic ethnography that aims to be humanist, reflective and fundamentally cinematographic. Year after year, our festival works towards the recognition ofthe ethnographic film as a cinematographic genre in its own right. Thus, we wish to promote “an ethnography” and a cinema of proximity, sometimes even of the ordinary, which joins the primary mission of socio-cultural anthropology.
A TEAM OF DEDICATED VOLUNTEERS
FIFEQ-MTL is an entirely voluntary, horizontal and democratic organization. Our volunteers come from multiple fields, from anthropology, art and film history, to bioinformatics, international development and urban studies. This diversity of profiles, this eclecticism of personalities, constitute a major asset, an essential ingredient for a rich program and a colorful festival.
ORGANIZING COMMITEE
Danielle Kouhio Depri
Artistic direction, general coordination and programming
Jamie Lee Foison
Artistic direction, screening and selection coordinator
Flandrine Lusson
Artistic direction and programming
Jade Miranda Neri
Artistic direction, communication officer
Andrea Serrano
Artistic direction, communication officer
Emilie Tullio
Programming intern
Justine Dorval
Communications and Audience Development Intern
THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Lily-Cannelle Mathieu
President
Thibault Tranchant
Vice-president
Naomie Décarie-Daigneault
Secretary
Danielle Kouhio Dépri
Administrator and liaison officer with the FIFEQ-Montréal organizing committee and with the FIFEQ-Québec team
Leïla Afriat
Administrator
Screening and selection committee
Manon Baudoin | Roger Gaboury | Cécile Bastide | Virginie Le Naour | Charles-Émile Lafrance | Kevin Semaan | Anna Henry | Louise Pinault-Southam | Clara Ferrando Costa | David Deladurantaye Leblanc | Mayra Bielma | Chelsea Sweetin | Harry Danon | Pascale Hebert | Alain Ayotte | Elsa Hetletvedt | Renata Moreira Fontoura | Eloise Lu | Lily-Cannelle Mathieu | Danielle Kouhio Depri
Programmers : Lily-Cannelle Mathieu | Danielle Kouhio Depri
Volunteers Coordinators : Jamie-Lee Foison | Flandrine Lusson
FOR 2021/2022 EDITION
We would also like to acknowledge the contributions of Pauline, Hélène, Geneviève, Marco, Jérémy, Irmak, Sophie, Lily-Cannelle, Khando, Sarah, Jade, Audrey, Ying, Thibault, Raphaël et Danielle.
FOR 2020/2021 EDITION
We would also like to acknowledge the contributions of Raphaël, Julie, Camille, Simon, Solène, Antonia, Daniel, Geneviève, Diego, Laeticia, Lily-Cannelle, Roxanne, Emmanuel, Hanine, Myriam, Paul, Olivia and Danielle.
MARCH 29, 2019
Le cinéma ethnographique sort des universités
« Le festival est en transition, explique Asmâa Hadji, coordonnatrice de l’événement. À l’origine dans les universités, on a voulu le sortir du milieu universitaire en organisant des projections à l’extérieur des institutions. »
APRIL 11, 2018
Ethnographic filmmaking shines at FIFEQ
“We’ve always tried to make it accessible to the public,” Seo said. “Our goal is just to share these films, we don’t have a judging panel or awards or prizes, we just want to share.”
MARCH 28, 2018
FIFEQ 2018:
Voix de femmes
Au programme: une série de documentaires dont un volet consacré aux femmes réalisatrices autochtones qui ont choisi le vecteur cinématographique pour exprimer toutes les facettes de leur identité.