We are delighted to be launching the first ever print zine of ECHO, Take One Action’s editorial platform for Scotland-based writers exploring the intersection of film criticism and social justice.

Join us at Sett Studios in Edinburgh to celebrate the launch with readings by our writers Hannah George, Bosco Iacobucci, and Lakshmi Ajay, in conversation with ECHO editor and Take One Action programmer Xuanlin Tham.

Together we’ll discuss climate thrillers, cinema as a mode of tenderness, the colonial origins of the camera and participatory filmmaking as a potential antidote. Cosy vibes with refreshments and snacks, zines beautifully and locally riso-printed by Out of the Blueprint, and a chance to find out more about ECHO and be in community with people who believe in the redemptive power of cinema, collectivity, and criticism!

ACCESS:

Sett Studios does not have a wheelchair accessible toilet, but Leith Depot (25m away, on the other side of the road) has an accessible toilet participants are welcome to use.

Please contact daisy@takeoneaction.org.uk if you have any questions about access for these sessions.

WRITER BIOS:

Hannah George is a writer and editor based in Glasgow. She writes poems and essays about living in the anthropocene and ecological entanglement. She is interested in the exciting possibilities of interdisciplinary writing, and is currently working towards a master’s in environment, culture & communication. You can read some of her work in journals such as Gutter, Wet Grain and SPAM zine.

Bosco lacobucci is a film studies graduate, researcher, and writer based in Glasgow. Their practice exists at the intersections of transfeminist cultural studies, affect and embodiment in trans and queer media, experimental audio-visual design and criticism. As a research-led artist, they are deeply drawn to cross-border/genre and audience-oriented writing practices, informed by a situated commitment to experiment as a critical methodology.

Jemma Desai is a commitment to softness searching for people and places where it is not necessary to be hard. As a writer and artist she seeks ways to hold the labour that strengthens bonds of love. She watches films and attends to the conditions that allow them to appear and circulate, how, where, and to whom. In recent years, attending to these aspects of showing films — as Ruth Wilson Gilmore would have it “Why this? Why this, here? Why this, here, now?” — has preoccupied her more than researching what films should or could be shown. This has meant films and programmes have rarely been assembled at all. She wants this space of absence to be known as a space of desire.

Lakshmi Ajay is a visual artist, writer and social worker, living in Edinburgh. Her work is inspired by her experiences of migration, finding pockets of community along the way and dreaming of abolitionist futures. She creates art in the hope that they lead to enduring spaces of care, connection and revolution.