SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
Dissident Artists Collaborate in Laura Poitras Documentary
10-minute video by award-winning filmmaker shows WikiLeaks activist Jacob Appelbaum and artist Ai Weiwei building installation in Beijing
Jun 09, 2015
Acclaimed journalist and filmmaker Laura Poitras on Tuesday released her first film since last year's Academy Award-winning Citizenfour--a 10-minute video for the New York Times which chronicles artist Ai Weiwei and WikiLeaks activist Jacob Appelbaum collaborating on a project.
Ai and Appelbaum are both known for their work against unchecked government power and state surveillance in China and the U.S., their respective home countries. They began building their installation together in Beijing in April. Poitras--who, like Appelbaum, contributed to the publication of NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden's disclosure of widespread government surveillance in 2013--asked to film them.
Poitras writes for the Times:
The art project the pair made, "Panda to Panda," was not about surveillance. It was about secrets. They stuffed cuddly toy panda bears with public, shredded N.S.A. documents that were originally given to me and Glenn Greenwald two years ago in Hong Kong by the whistle-blower Edward Snowden. Inside each panda, Ai and Appelbaum placed a micro SD memory card containing a digital backup of the previously published documents.
The project's title, "Panda to Panda," is the synthesis of two terms created by dissident cultures. The slang term for the secret police in China is "panda," which is a censorship-evading Mandarin homonym: "national security" sounds like "national treasure," a.k.a. the panda. "Panda to Panda " also refers to peer-to-peer communication (P2P), a method of decentralized networking and a philosophy of egalitarian human interaction on the Internet.
Like the red lanterns Ai hung under every surveillance camera the government installed outside his studio, "Panda to Panda " playfully acknowledges and rejects state power.
Watch the video below:
An Urgent Message From Our Co-Founder
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It's never been this bad out there. And it's never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed, the threats we face are intensifying. We need your support now more than ever. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Will you donate now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
Nadia Prupis
Nadia Prupis is a former Common Dreams staff writer. She wrote on media policy for Truthout.org and has been published in New America Media and AlterNet. She graduated from UC Santa Barbara with a BA in English in 2008.
Acclaimed journalist and filmmaker Laura Poitras on Tuesday released her first film since last year's Academy Award-winning Citizenfour--a 10-minute video for the New York Times which chronicles artist Ai Weiwei and WikiLeaks activist Jacob Appelbaum collaborating on a project.
Ai and Appelbaum are both known for their work against unchecked government power and state surveillance in China and the U.S., their respective home countries. They began building their installation together in Beijing in April. Poitras--who, like Appelbaum, contributed to the publication of NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden's disclosure of widespread government surveillance in 2013--asked to film them.
Poitras writes for the Times:
The art project the pair made, "Panda to Panda," was not about surveillance. It was about secrets. They stuffed cuddly toy panda bears with public, shredded N.S.A. documents that were originally given to me and Glenn Greenwald two years ago in Hong Kong by the whistle-blower Edward Snowden. Inside each panda, Ai and Appelbaum placed a micro SD memory card containing a digital backup of the previously published documents.
The project's title, "Panda to Panda," is the synthesis of two terms created by dissident cultures. The slang term for the secret police in China is "panda," which is a censorship-evading Mandarin homonym: "national security" sounds like "national treasure," a.k.a. the panda. "Panda to Panda " also refers to peer-to-peer communication (P2P), a method of decentralized networking and a philosophy of egalitarian human interaction on the Internet.
Like the red lanterns Ai hung under every surveillance camera the government installed outside his studio, "Panda to Panda " playfully acknowledges and rejects state power.
Watch the video below:
Nadia Prupis
Nadia Prupis is a former Common Dreams staff writer. She wrote on media policy for Truthout.org and has been published in New America Media and AlterNet. She graduated from UC Santa Barbara with a BA in English in 2008.
Acclaimed journalist and filmmaker Laura Poitras on Tuesday released her first film since last year's Academy Award-winning Citizenfour--a 10-minute video for the New York Times which chronicles artist Ai Weiwei and WikiLeaks activist Jacob Appelbaum collaborating on a project.
Ai and Appelbaum are both known for their work against unchecked government power and state surveillance in China and the U.S., their respective home countries. They began building their installation together in Beijing in April. Poitras--who, like Appelbaum, contributed to the publication of NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden's disclosure of widespread government surveillance in 2013--asked to film them.
Poitras writes for the Times:
The art project the pair made, "Panda to Panda," was not about surveillance. It was about secrets. They stuffed cuddly toy panda bears with public, shredded N.S.A. documents that were originally given to me and Glenn Greenwald two years ago in Hong Kong by the whistle-blower Edward Snowden. Inside each panda, Ai and Appelbaum placed a micro SD memory card containing a digital backup of the previously published documents.
The project's title, "Panda to Panda," is the synthesis of two terms created by dissident cultures. The slang term for the secret police in China is "panda," which is a censorship-evading Mandarin homonym: "national security" sounds like "national treasure," a.k.a. the panda. "Panda to Panda " also refers to peer-to-peer communication (P2P), a method of decentralized networking and a philosophy of egalitarian human interaction on the Internet.
Like the red lanterns Ai hung under every surveillance camera the government installed outside his studio, "Panda to Panda " playfully acknowledges and rejects state power.
Watch the video below:
We've had enough. The 1% own and operate the corporate media. They are doing everything they can to defend the status quo, squash dissent and protect the wealthy and the powerful. The Common Dreams media model is different. We cover the news that matters to the 99%. Our mission? To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. How? Nonprofit. Independent. Reader-supported. Free to read. Free to republish. Free to share. With no advertising. No paywalls. No selling of your data. Thousands of small donations fund our newsroom and allow us to continue publishing. Can you chip in? We can't do it without you. Thank you.