The School of Visual Arts MFA Social Documentary Film program guides and supports emerging filmmakers to explore fully the social documentary film form and, in so doing, to find innovative ways to examine and communicate the core experiences and events that define us. SVA’s award-winning faculty is helmed by producer Maro Chermayeff (Half the Sky), Deborah Dickson (Lalee’s Kin), Richard Hankin (The Jinx), Kirsten Johnson (Citizenfour), Ross Kauffman (E-Team) and Sam Pollard (4 Little Girls), among others. Program alumni’s films have screened at festivals around the world, aired on PBS and been theatrically distributed. SVA MFA Social Documentary Film is DOC NYC’s official educational partner.
SVA’s showcase includes: Michel makes videos for his No More Sad (USA, 2 min., Alex Budman) campaign to try to make the internet a friendlier place. Pele, My Paradise (USA, 9 min. teaser, Antonella Carrasco) is an island where the perception of nature as something sacred is a way of life. The Wonder Workshop (USA, 5 min., Amitabh Joshi) in Tanzania trains men and women living with polio to earn an income from handmade crafts. Last Days of Domino (USA, 5 min., Yuqi Kang) offers a peek inside Williamsburg’s landmark Domino Sugar Refinery, recently turned into luxury apartments. 22-year-old Sister Jolin (USA, 10 min. teaser, Siyan Liu, Danni Wang), a former factory girl turned sex worker, undergoes risky plastic surgery to become an actress in Shanghai. Ray Valenz: Fire Breather (USA, 6 min., Lizzie Minges) is the host of the Coney Island Circus Sideshow, breathing life into the long-lived sensation. In 18 Seconds (USA, 9 min., Nori Mizukami), the bystander of a sexual assault questions the response to crime on the NYC subway. Sierra Leonean surfers strive to improve their village while facing the impact of the Ebola epidemic in Tide to Stone (USA, 2 min. trailer, David Hoon Newman). H Nagano (USA, 10 min., Miwa Sakulrat, BFA Film), a scuba diver and marine photographer based in Palau, reflects on his life. A glimpse inside the world of Oliver (USA, 16 min., Lacy Wangen), a three- year-old boy growing up in Manhattan’s Upper West Side.
