Fellowship Engagement
UnionDocs invites four pairs of artists and thinkers to expand radical filmmaking practices and new languages of documentary cinema through a mode of collaborative research that
This fellowship opens up different moments of convening and invites correspondence between the pairs throughout with the aim to both support inventive forms and methods of nonfiction filmmaking and to study the effects of these conceptual and practical choices. Our hope is it can offer better ways to understand how such work operates in the world and engages with progressive social movements.
Each fellow will receive a significant fee for their participation, which includes an invitation to DocLisboa in Portugal, a retreat at EMPAC at Rensselaer in Troy, New York, and an invitation to El Seminario Del Futuro at FICUNAM. Funding comes with participation requirements and engagement in the project and publication, but is otherwise unrestricted for the artists. Funding for our thinkers is a commission tied to the commissioning and editing of a collection of writing, including an introduction to these texts and a separate key piece of original authorship.
This fellowship is for North American artists and writers and will be conducted in English.
Applications are accepted through a nomination process.
New Connections & a Shared Research Proposal
We invite a critical thinker, (curator, writer, or editor) and a documentary filmmaker to apply together, proposing a central question to motivate their regular intellectual and creative exchange over the fellowship research year.
UnionDocs will lead a matchmaking process that will pair-up selected writers and filmmakers who will then be invited to develop a shared research proposal for part two of the application.
This collaboration should root in the artist’s film practice and offer resources for the further development of their projects, aesthetics, and methodologies. Workshopped through a series of in-person gatherings and epistolary exchanges, the proposed focus of research will ultimately be addressed in a final collection of publications to be conceived of and some authored by the writer.
Seeking Documentary Artists
with a celebrated body of work demonstrating significant formal experimentation.
with one or more current works-in-progress that continue or expand their practice.
with enthusiasm to actively engage a critical dialogue on their work alongside the work of others, especially concerning how it operates in the world and how it impacts social movements.
With the availability and openness to commit to a collaborative process.
Seeking Writers, Editors, Scholars, Curators
with established research skills and exemplary published work.
with a significant interest in artful and experimental documentary film, though applicants from disciplines beyond film studies or film criticism are strongly encouraged to apply.
With the availability and openness to commit to a collaborative process.