Bio
Marusya Bociurkiw is a filmmaker, author and academic who is obsessed with archives, memory, and food (which is also an archive). She is the director of 10 films, author of 6 books including, most recently, Food Was her Country: The Memoir of a Queer Daughter. Her most recent film, the award-winning doc “This Is Gay Propaganda: LGBT Rights & the War in Ukraine”, screened in 12 countries and was translated into 3 languages. Her books have won and been shortlisted for several awards including Kobzar Award, Lambda Literary Award and Independent Publisher Award. She is a longtime organizer and activist, and is currently Co-Director of The Studio for Media Activism &Critical Thought at Ryerson. She is currently working on a new documentary called “Before #MeToo: The Story of a Feminist Media Revolution.” She also has a food blog called Recipes For Trouble: A Pandemic Food Diary. In her teaching, writing and filmmaking she works at the intersection of art, social justice, collaboration, and friendship.
Questionaire
Why did you get involved in this project?
- I suddenly had time on my hands.
- Midi asked me
- It seemed intriguing, and I love collaborating with other artists.
Did the one week turn-around for the work help or hinder your creativity?
I must admit I was late in handing in my camera work, so I’d say maybe a bit more than one week would be good.
How did you feel about working on a project where you didn’t know who you were collaborating with?
I liked it. It was mysterious and magical. Would be nice to meet the others at some point, maybe a zoom party!
Has being involved in the project changed your thoughts on creativity?
I did visuals on one of the films, which was challenging for me, as I usually hire a videographer, and even though it was very low stakes, I was nervous about it. However, it really opened up something in me, in terms of wanting to experiment more with my camera and working more intuitively.
If you worked on several videos, what kept you coming back for more and how many did you do?
I worked on 2 videos. I think it was seeing the final edit of the first video that made me want to work on another. These are powerful works, created by a diverse creative community. [Midi, have a look at Homemade on Netflix, if you haven’t already – short films about the pandemic – I think the ones created in EXC 19 are just as powerful]