Third World Newsreel (TWN)

1968–Present
Location

New York City, New York, United States of America

Description

Third World Newsreel (TWN) is an alternative media arts organization that fosters the creation, appreciation, preservation and dissemination of independent film and video by and about people of color and social justice issues. It supports innovative work of diverse forms and genres made by artists who are intimately connected to their subjects through common bonds of ethnic/cultural heritage, class position, gender, sexual orientation and political identification. TWN promotes the self-representation of traditionally marginalized groups as well as the negotiated representation of those groups by artists who work in solidarity with them. Ultimately, whether documentary, experimental, narrative, traditional or non-traditional, the importance of the media promoted by the organization is its ability to effect social change, to encourage people to think critically about their lives and the lives of others, and to propel people into action.

“Third World Newsreel Mission,” Third World Newsreel - Film Training, Distribution & Production, accessed March 5, 2024, https://www.twn.org/twnpages/about/responsive/about_1.aspx.
Works in catalogue
  • A default icon for a node which has no primary image

    Eunuchs: India's Third Gender

    film/video, 1991

    An ethnographic film that looks at the changing face of India's third gender communities. Using the Hijra traditions, but outcast for refusing to submit to Hijra hierarchy and become her guru's property after her castration, Kiran, modern and intellectual, seems destined to gather around her other young, educated, homosexuals, transvestites and Hijras in the rural Gujarat where she lives with her lorry driver lover and become an independent guru in her own right.

  • A default icon for a node which has no primary image

    Stonewall

    film/video, 1995

    Loving and ribald, this tribute to the Stonewall uprising follows the fortunes and misfortunes of a host of characters including drag queen LaMiranda and the clean-cut budding activist, Matty Dean.

  • A default icon for a node which has no primary image

    Against The Grain

    film/video, 2011

    Against the Grain transforms the canon of documenting gender transformation, breaks the script of the gender binary & the linear racial focus. Against the Grain follows the story of OluSeyi, a cultural organizer, artist, healer, & Queer Nigerian whose spirit is transcending gender. While documenting a gathered of gender non-conforming & transgender People of Color. People discuss what it means to be "us", engaging the complexities of our race/class/gender/ sexuality/ gender expression in this white supremacist/ patriarchal/ capitalist society.

  • A default icon for a node which has no primary image

    Trans Lives Matter! Justice for Islan Nettles

    film/video, 2013

    Islan Nettles was beaten to death in front of a NYPD precint in Harlem. This film takes place steps away from where she was murdered during her community vigil.

  • Two people are lying next to each other on a blanket, each with their hair splayed out loosely onto the floor above their head. The person on the left has long light brown hair, is wearing clear glasses, and wears a black-and-red tank top. The person on the right has long brown hair, a black-and-red tank top with a different design, and fishnet-arm sleeves. The person on the left is lighting an object with a lighter that they are holding in their right hand. The person on the right has their arm laid out across their chest, reaching gently towards the object being lit. They are both looking at the object as it gets lit.

    Sydney & Kim

    film/video, 2023

    SYDNEY and KIM is a film about the demise of a close friendship, exploring how sickness and debility transform what we hold most dear. After 25-year old Sydney is released from the hospital following a major facial surgery, her best friend Kim cares for her at a motel during her recovery. As Kim's flirtation with the motel manager escalates, Sydney's resentment begins to boil over. Through intimate moments in their motel room, Sydney and Kim navigate the implicit expectations of their friendship.