Reel Community

By Ben Siegel

This story originally appeared in the November/December issue of Block Club Magazine.

When Dorothea Braemer arrived in Buffalo in 2003, the West Berlin resident first caught wind of a decayed downtown Main Street – its empty storefronts, its lack of commercial development, a decaying residential community, all the while dividing the city’s crime-ridden East Side from the promising West Side.

“People were telling me, ‘Main Street is just like the Berlin Wall, dividing the city.’ So I thought, oh that’s a cool topic,” says Braemer.

A cool topic for a film project, Braemer, executive director of Squeaky Wheel media arts center, thought.  But where this media artist might have made a film of her own, Braemer thought to put the inquiries she had of Main Street back into the hands of its citizens.

From this seed the Buffalo Youth Media Institute was born.  The intensive nine-month project gives 20 Western New York high school students the tools and education to make their own 10-minute documentary about a given topic.  The program’s first year focused on Main Street – based on those areas of blight that reminded Braemer of her native Berlin – while last year discussed the waterfront.  This year’s subject is the East Side.

The program serves many purposes.  Students not only get access to media equipment and training, but also areas of their city with which they might not be familiar.  Using the arts as a tool for change is at the forefront of the mission, Braemer says.

“The goals of the institute are to give young people opportunities to be imaginatively engaged with their local communities through the powerful medium of film.  At the same time learning several skills while doing it, such as research of local community issues and learning how to make films basically from scratch,” says Braemer.

She insists students need not know how to produce film (or video, the cheaper and more workable medium most students use). “Some people who have participated have never touched a camera; some have some background.”

Project director Jackie Farris agrees that arts education initiatives like this improve developmental skills and inspires social and civic empowerment.

“Art can be and often is the first tool of social change. By linking the process of film making to social issues, we are helping them bridge the gap between kids who make movies and youth who make change,” says Farris, an intern during the institute’s first year and now its director, alongside media instructor Brian Milbrand.

Farris weaves a sense of cultural literacy into the mix as well.

“They come to understand that behind every thing they see, there is a huge process of construction and meaning built into that image. They are given the tools to create as well as deconstruct their media saturated environment,” she says.

Under the umbrella topic the students must work within, a wide range of subjects comes to the surface.

“What really surprises me about the students is the variety of ideas they come up with.  In the last year alone we have had projects vary from death (“The Infected District,” J. Felong) and destruction to hope and new beginnings (“The Wright Boathouse,” T. Casarsa),” she says.

The process began in October, when applications were due to Braemer.  From a pool of 50 to 60 applicants, 20 students are selected from all areas of Western New York.  Twice a week students meet with Farris and Milbrand, where they receive technical instruction, story arch planning, lectures from educators and neighborhood walking tours.  The program concludes in June with a screening at the Market Arcade Film Center.

Braemer hopes these films will reach wider audiences than those just in this area code.

“It really should be shown on national PBS,” she says.  “That would be my dream.  I think television is the way to go.” In addition to airing the documentaries on Squeaky Wheel’s public access show, Art Grease, Braemer takes them to national youth media festivals.  And they’ve gotten a positive response.  “‘Portraits of Main Street’ was shown at the Future Filmmaker Festival in Chicago, and they picked up over half of our films to show in this festival.”

Executive director Dorothea Braemer

Though the rigorous schedule keeps the students busy for much of their school year in return for a wealth of knowledge and experience, they’re also getting paid for their time at an hourly rate.

“The idea is that you want to validate that work, that we’re asking them to do a job instead of sitting there begging them to come up with something creative, which is how I see a lot of youth media projects,” says Braemer, who has shepherded many youth media projects in Philadelphia. We have high standards and you see it in the films.  And they are proud of getting this job.”

Pride, awareness, civic action – these are words Braemer does not toss around lightly, especially when talking about high school kids.

“What I’ve seen with these [kids] so far is that a lot of them have a lot more passion [than adults] and a willingness to find solutions for problems, like no access at the waterfront.  Adults have that, but it’s hard to say … of course there are adults with passion, otherwise nothing would get done here.

“But you have to be really engaged in what you’re making a film about.  Otherwise you couldn’t make a film.  And there’s something really powerful about having a strong opinion about something,” says Braemer.

Block Club Online will continue to follow the stories of this year’s participants.  Look for updates throughout the school year at Block Club Online.

For more information on the Buffalo Youth Media Institute, visit Squeaky Wheel online.

Posted by on 11/12 at 05:00 PM