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Melina Pafundi is an artist-in-residence with Polar Film Lab at Kysten (Troms fylkeskultursenter). Polar Film Lab will present a talk from Pafundi about her practice and a short screening of one of her works.
"What does it mean to 'restore' an image that was created through a lens of colonial power? And how does that process change when we work with films born from a struggle for independence?
In this talk, film restorer and filmmaker Melina Pafundi explores the dual nature of archival work through two contrasting projects. First, she dissects her recent thesis on 'Aus dem Leben der Kate auf Deutsch Neuguinea (1909)', a German colonial film first ever shot on Papua New Guinean soil. She reveals how physical clues—like a 1924 edge code hidden in a 1963 film—expose layers of propaganda, translation of “the other”´s culture, and historical ethnographic films as an educational tool.
As a counterpart, Melina shares her work with Geba Films Coop and Abotcha Mediateca in Guinea-Bissau, where she helped catalog the foundational films of the first Guinean filmmakers. Unlike the 'captured' images of 1909, these films were tools of liberation. However, they face a different colonial hurdle today: being scattered across European and North American archives.
Drawing from her experience as an archival producer for the documentary 'Sou um simples africano' (dir. Flora Gomes, Sana na N’Hada & Suleimane Biai), Melina discusses the delicate process of negotiating with global archives to waive copyright fees and share heritage. This talk moves beyond technical 'cleaning' to ask a vital question: How can we use restoration to return history to its rightful owners?"
Melina Pafundi is an Argentine filmmaker and restorer based in Berlin (Labor Berlin). Her work in 16 and 35 mm investigates colonial archives and suppressed memories, combining philosophy and analog technique. She has screened at Oberhausen, BFI Flare, and FIDBA, among others. Notable works include Futuro, When the Androgynous Child (2019), and Gedenken (2018). After collaborating on film restoration in Guinea-Bissau, she developed Äquator Song, a cinematic intervention that offers aesthetic reparation
Pafundi will also lead a workshop at Polar Film Lab as part of her residency.