Project Title: MAQUILOPOLIS
Recipient Organization: Global Exchange
Fiscal Sponsor: Film Arts Foundation
Lead Artist: Sergio De La Torre
Genre and Date Awarded: Media Arts, June 2001
To Be Presented: Summer 2004

Installation artist and photographer Sergio de la Torre and filmmaker Vicky Funari are collaborating with Global Exchange and the Grupo Factor X to produce an hour-long bilingual documentary about Tijuana factory workers and the impact of globalization on both sides of the United States-Mexico border. The finished work will be an hour-long documentary, entitled MAQUILOPOLIS.

Maquilladoras are the multinationally-owned assembly factories which dominate the economy of the United States-Mexico border region. The industry employs over one million workers and accounts for 73% of Mexico’s manufacturing. Women originally represented more than 80% of the maquiladora work force, although men are entering it in increasing numbers. The maquiladoras have played a significant role in cultural transformations, in gender roles and family structure in Mexico and in Mexican immigrant communities in the United States. They also have deeply affected migration patterns between the two countries.

Tijuana itself has more than quadrupled in size since the advent of the maquiladora industry. The workers have had to respond to lack of housing, human rights violations, low wages, and environmental hazards. In MAQUILOPOLIS, Tijuanenses will communicate their own creative and persistent means of confronting the reality in which they find themselves, and in so doing expose the complexities of their lives. Through the stories of five workers, the film will link the themes of work, housing, human rights, and ecological catastrophe. The film uses multiple storytelling strategies to reflect the nature of life on the border, weaving together interviews, verité scenes of the characters’ lives at home and work, video diaries shot by the participants themselves, industrial cityscapes based on De La Torre’s photographs, aerial landscapes exposing the geography of the maquiladora systems, and stylized images drawn from the participants’ memories and stories. MAQUILOPOLIS will be a bilingual, bi-national film made by and for Latinos, by and for women, by and for working people, and by and for borderland people.

Sergio De La Torre and Vicky Funari will co-produce and co-direct MAQUILOPOLIS. Both producers are working Bay Area artists with roots in the Latino community. Funari was raised in Mexico City and maintains a lifelong connection to Mexican and Latino communities. She has been making award-winning films in San Francisco since 1988, focusing primarily on the lives of working women and on questions of cultural and gender identity. De La Torre grew up in the Tijuana/San Diego border area and migrated to San Francisco as a college student. His photographic, performance, and installation works have focused on Diaspora/tourism and identity politics.

Grupo Factor X is a Tijuana women’s group which helps factory workers organize for better working conditions and human rights. Through the Casa de la Mujer, located in a working-class neighborhood, Grupo Factor X offers a variety of programs: support groups for battered women; classes on reproductive and workplace health; workshops on how to deal with sexual harassment in the workplace; assistance in investigating human rights violations in the maquiladoras; a legal clinic; and workshops on labor organizing. Through Grupo Factor X, a community of active, empowered workers, known as promotoras, is emerging. As a key element of the MAQUILOPOLIS project, Grupo Factor X will host a video workshop during which the filmmakers and the promotoras will work together to develop the images and words for the film.

Global Exchange is a human rights organization dedicated to promoting environmental, political, and social justice around the world. By providing analysis of how the global economy works and how we can act to change it, Global Exchange hopes to build a growing grassroots movement for furthering economic democratization. Since its founding in 1988, Global Exchange has been providing educational programs, including “Reality Tours” to a variety of countries. As part of this film project, in 2001 a “Reality Tour” to the border region will include two of the Grupo Factor X promotoras and the two lead artists, filming the interaction between tour participants and Tijuana activists for inclusion in MAQUILOPOLIS.

The filmmakers, Global Exchange and Grupo Factor X are engaged in asking many of the same questions and share many of the same goals. In addition to working together during filming, they also will assist with distribution. Global Exchange will launch the film through a Gala Premiere event in San Francisco and receive copies as gifts for donors as well as an exhibition copy to show at events. Grupo Factor X is assisting the filmmakers with a grassroots plan for the film’s distribution in Mexico. It will help to implement that plan and receive a portion of the proceeds from that distribution.

Artist Sergio De La Torre has previously collaborated with both local and international nonprofit organizations. In 1997, he collaborated with Casa de los Jovenes and Southern Exposure in San Francisco on a year-long project entitled “Power in the House,” involving middle school students. Through this project a series of digitally produced cards narrated the relations between first generation Mexican-American teenagers and their immigrant parents. Internationally, in 1998, in collaboration with artist Coco Fusco and Grupo Factor X, he created a video installation, ACCESS DENIED/ACCESO NEGADO, commissioned by El Museo de las Bellas Artes de Caracas, Venezuela, which narrates an incident that affected the life of maquiladora worker Delfina Rodriguez.

RESUME HIGHLIGHTS

Selected Exhibitions

• “The Ideal”, photography, International Center of Photography, New York, NY (2003)
• “While you were Gone”, installation, Headlands Center for the Arts, Sausalito, CA (2003)
• “Thinking About Expansion”, installation, Lizabeth Oliveria Gallery, San Francisco, CA (2003)
• “10 Houses”, video, The Museum of New Art (MONA), Detroit, MI (2003)
• “TheHousingProject,” installation, ProArts Gallery, Oakland, California (2002)
• “Carmen’s House”, installation, Cedille Space (with Torolab), Paris, France (2002)
• “Disappearing,” video installation for group show, San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art, San Jose, California (2001), “Angels + Aliens” at San Francisco Art Institute Walter/McBean Gallery and for group exhibition, “Unthinkable Tenderness” at San Francisco State University Art Gallery (1998)
• “99 Actions,” in collaboration with Armando Rascon and Julio Morales, performance for inSITE 2000, Tijuana, BC Mexico (2000)
• “Disappearing,” video installation for group show, San Jose Museum of Modern Art, San Jose, California (2000), Casa de la Cultural Casa Lamm, Mexico City, Mexico (2000)
• “Live Work Series No. 1,” installation for group show, “Hybrid” at Southern Exposure Gallery, San Francisco, California (2000)
• “The Grand Museum Series No. 1,” video installation in collaboration with Julio Morales, for group exhibition, “Museum Pieces,” DeYoung Museum, San Francisco, California (1999)
• “Access Denied,” collaboration with Coco Fusco, video interactive installation for the Bienal Barro de America, Museo de Bellas Artes, Caracas, Venezuela (1998)
• “Rights of Passage,” assistant for Coco Fusco, performance/installation for the Second Johanessburg Biennale, Johanessburg, South Africa (1997)
• “Prophetic Accidents,” in collaboration with Julio Morales and Domingo Nuño, performance for Bay Area Awards at New Langton Arts, San Francisco, California (1997)
• “Mexiclone,” in collaboration with Julio Morales and Domingo Nuño, public art display at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Garden Walk ’97, San Francisco, California (1997)
• “Boleros,” in collaboration with Julio Morales and Domingo Nuño, performance for The Cleveland International Performance Festival, Cleveland, Ohio (1997)
• “Road Signs,” in collaboration with Julio Morales and Domingo Nuño, public art display at San Francisco State University Municipal Railway Station’s bus shelters, San Francisco, California (1997)
• “Keep Them Still Running,” a video installation for group show, Sound/Image/Object, University Art Gallery, Sonoma State University, Sonoma, California (1997)
• “Out of the World,” a collaboration with Julio Morales and Domingo Nuño, performance for “Border Subjects International Conference,” University of Illinois, Normal, Illinois
• “Go Unnoticed,” for group show, “Go Unnoticed: Images of (Re)Generation,” Galeria de la Raza, San Francisco, California (1996)

Video

• “La Raza,” directed by Adolfo Davila, photography, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, California (1992)
• “Los Que Se Van,” Directed by Adolfo Davila, production assistant, Segunda Bienal de Video, Guadalajara, México (1991)

Awards

• National Endowment for the Arts, Washington, DC (2003)
• Headlands Center for the Arts, Project Space, Sausalito, CA (2003)
• CCAC Faculty Development Grant, San Francisco, CA (2003)
• Threshold Foundation, San Francisco, CA (2002)
• The New World Foundation, New York, NY (2002)
• Potrero Nuevo Fund Prize, Administered by New Langton Arts, San Francisco, California (2001)
• The Creative Work Fund, San Francisco, CA (2001)
• The Creative Capital Foundation, New York, NY(2001)
• Fiedeicomiso México-U.S.A. para La Cultura y Las Artes, Bi-national award, FONCA (Mexico) and The Rockefeller Foundation (USA) (2000)
• Cultural Equity Grant, San Francisco Arts Commission, San Francisco, California (1999)
• Eureka Fellowship, The Fleishhacker Foundation, San Francisco, California (1998)
• Bay Area Awards, New Langton Arts, Performance Art, San Francisco, California (1997)

Vicky Funari

Filmography/Videography

• Director/Camera/Editor, “Live Nude Girls Unite!,” a feature-length documentary about the successful unionization of exotic dancers at a San Francisco peep show. Co-directed with Julia Query (2000). Selected Awards: Audience Award for Best Documentary, San Francisco International Film Festival (2000). Selected screenings: 2000 SXSW Film Festival, 2000 Atlanta Film and Video Festival, 2000 Flaherty Seminar, 2000 Sheffield International Documentary Film Festival, HBO/Cinemax screening (2001)
• Producer/Director/Camera/Editor, “Paulina,” a documentary feature film about a resilient Mexican woman whose parents traded her for land when she was a child. Co-produced with Jennifer Maytorena Taylor. Completed in January 1998. Selected awards: Grand Jury Prize, 1998 San Francisco International Film Festival; Best Documentary, 1998 San Antonio CineFestival; Lifetime Television’s Vision Award; 1999 Hamptons Film Festival. Selected screenings: Havana’s 1997 Festival of New Latin American Cinema; 1998 Sundance Film Festival; International Critics’ Week, 12998 Locarno Film Festival; 1998 Amsterdam International Documentary Film Festival; Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1998; 2000 Flaherty Seminar. Theatrical release: spring 1999. Aired on Sundance Channel in 2000.
• Producer/Director/Camera/Editor, “Skin*es*the*si*a,” an 18-minute experimental videotape. Completed in July 1994. Jury award, 1995 New York Expo of Short Film and Video. Selected screenings: 1994 Film Arts Festival, San Francisco; 1995 Berlin International Gay and Lesbian Film Festival; MIX 95 New York Lesbian and Gay Experimental Film Festival; 1996 Oberhausen International Short Film Festival; 1996 Chicago Underground Film Festival. Aired on Free Speech TV in 1997.
• Producer/Camera, “Alternative Conceptions,” a half-hour video documentary about lesbians having children by donor insemination. Directed by Christina Sunley. Completed in June 1986. Honorable mention, 1987 National Council on Family Relations Film Awards Competition. Selected screenings: 1987 San Francisco International Lesbian and Gay Film Festival; 1987 Women in the Director’s Chair Film Festival. Aired on KQED-TV’s “Viewpoints” in 1992.

Selected Production and Post-Production Work

• Assistant Director, “Working Girls,” a fiction feature film, directed by Lizzie Borden, New York, New York, Premiered at the 1986 Cannes Film Festival. Distributed theatrically by Miramax.
• Editor, “Routine Disturbances,” short narrative film, directed by Julia Segrove Jaurigui. World premiere: 2000 Mill Valley Film Festival. Aired on KQED TV in fall 2000.
• Camera/Editor, “Bionic Beauty Salon, a short experimental documentary, directed by Gretchen Stoeltje. Screenings: Bernal Heights Film Festival; Artists’ Television Access, March 2000; 2000 Dallas Video Festival.
• Camera/Editor, “Big Changes, Big Choices,” a 12-part educational series for middle-school students, directed by Jim Watson, Elkind & Sweet Communications, San Francisco. Aired nationally on PBS. (1993)
• Camera,” Dinkinsville” and “Snow White Dreams,” an interactive video and music performance by Abigail Child and Ikue Mori, Performed live at New Langton Arts, San Francisco (1992)
• Camera,” The Great Dykes of Holland,” a music video, directed by Jennifer Maytorena Taylor. Screenings include: Whitney Museum; 2993 London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival, British Film Institute; 1993 San Francisco International Lesbian and Gay Film Festival.
• Post-production Supervisor, “Secrets of the Bay,” a half-hour ecological film on San Francisco Bay, directed by Chris Beaver and Judy Irving. Premiered at the California Academy of Sciences (1990)
• Assistant Editor, “Westward to China,” and “The China Call,” two-hour-long episodes of a PBS documentary series on the American experience in China, directed by James Culp, San Francisco.
• Associate Producer/Post-production Supervisor, “Out of the Way Café,” a 16mm fiction featurette, directed by Chris Beaver and Judy Irving, San Francisco.
• Assistant Editor, “A River Called Ohio,” hour-long historical documentary on the Ohio River Valley, directed by Tom Weidlinger, Berkeley, California; Produced by PBS station WPBY-TV, Huntington, West Virginia.