Mobile Film Screenings: A Wide-Reaching Tool for Civic Outreach

By: Meghan Schneider, Accountability Lab Summer Design Resident Earlier this year students at the Liberia Film Institute (LFI) created a series of documentaries and dramas about the Ebola epidemic that ravaged Liberia. The films covered a range of topics including the stigma survivors face, sexual transmission of the disease, and accusations that emergency workers still have not received proper compensation. These films were first shown in June, when the Accountability Lab and LFI co-sponsored a film festival on the University of Liberia’s Capitol Hill campus in Monrovia. After the showing in Monrovia, LFI began traveling to all of Liberia’s counties [...]

2015-08-03T00:00:00+00:003rd August 2015|

“I have to do what has to be done”: Leslie Lumeh and the Fight for Liberia’s Cultural Heritage

By: Brooks Marmon and Jim Tuttle, Accountability Lab in Monrovia, Liberia. This blog post was originally published as an article in Images Magazine, Edition 16. A Leslie Lumeh has been proclaimed “Liberia’s most celebrated artist” by CNN. A product of Booker Washington Institute, the visual artist has received accolades from wide and afar, with his works presented at exhibitions in Cote d’Ivoire, Gabon, South Africa, and the United States. His services are widely in demand by Liberia’s international partners, such as the UNICEF, the US Embassy, and the International Committee of the Red Cross. Stating that “I came to the earth as an artist”, Leslie notes that he began his career by [...]

2015-07-24T00:00:00+00:0024th July 2015|

Integrity Gets Great Ratings

Integrity Gets Great Ratings How Nepalis harnessed the power of reality TV to strike a blow against corruption. BY BLAIR GLENCORSE, SUMAN PARAJULI. Originally published in Foreign Policy. To Gyan Mani Nepal, the newly appointed head of education in Panchthar, a small and beautiful corner of far eastern Nepal, the situation in his school district was a depressing reminder of his own youth. Teacher absenteeism was as high as 90 percent; those who did come to work often showed up drunk. Others shook principals down for bribes just to come to their jobs. Schools were regularly shut down by political [...]

2015-07-09T00:00:00+00:009th July 2015|

Liberia’s Political Accountability Art

Liberia's Political Accountability Art By Brooks Marmon, Accountability Lab in Monrovia, Liberia. Originally published in Okay Africa. (Photo from ‘Accountability Art: Liberia’s Quest for Integrity’ by Jim Tuttle. Click here to see full gallery of artwork.)  An artistic culture is starting to resume in Liberia, with a number of African curio shops lining the road to Robertsfield Airport and Monrovia’s busy Waterside Market. Nonetheless, an exhibition of Liberian art has proven more common in the West than in Monrovia, where the commercial business district has not housed an art gallery since 2012. Accountability Art: Liberia’s Quest for Integrity, on display at the National [...]

2015-07-01T00:00:00+00:001st July 2015|

LiVArts And Accountability Lab Resume Art Classes

”Clean Your Community”, by George N. Flomo, first place winner “Stop Beating Your Partner”, by Emmanuel F. Yekeh Jr., second place winner “Teacher Refusing Bribe”, by Tracy Lumeh, third place winner of the Accountability Art Class. LiVArts And Accountability Lab Resume Art Classes By: Robin Dopoe Jr, [email protected]. Originally published in the Daily Observer. Liberia Visual Arts Academy (LiVArts), in collaboration with the Accountability Lab, has finally resumed art classes in an effort to reassure its commitment to the development of youth art. At the reopening of the art classes last weekend, Mr. Brooks Marmon, Program Director of Accountability Lab said, [...]

2015-06-18T00:00:00+00:0018th June 2015|

LiVArts and Accountability Lab Re-launch Accountability Arts School for Youth

Liberia Visual Arts Academy and Accountability Lab Re-launch Accountability Arts School for Youth Press Release by Francis Lansana of Accountability Lab and Leon Wilson of LiVArts. The Liberia Visual Arts Academy (LIVArts) and the Accountability Lab are pleased to announce the re-launch on Saturday, June 6, of a collaborative Accountability Arts School following a long period of postponement induced by the Ebola crisis. The School will consist of three monthly sessions followed by a public exhibition of the artwork produced by participating students. The Accountability Lab will offer technical and financial assistance for the initiative while LIVArts will oversee logistics and all [...]

2015-06-03T00:00:00+00:003rd June 2015|

Shaking Up the Status Quo in Nepal

Shaking Up the Status Quo in Nepal By BLAIR GLENCORSE and SUJEEV SHAKYA. Originally Published in the New York Times.   “Ke garne?” an old lady said to us, tears pouring down her cheeks, as we visited her earthquake-battered village in the Dhading district of Nepal last month: “What to do?” With a history of repeated crises — political, economic and natural — it has become the Nepali way to shrug one’s shoulders and hope for the best. Sadly, people have been hoping for a long time: even before the earthquakes, Nepal was one of the poorest, most corrupt and least [...]

2015-06-01T00:00:00+00:001st June 2015|

The Faces of Liberia Film Institute

The Faces of Liberia Film Institute Divine Key Anderson (left) teaches a class about the use of a green screen in film making at the Liberia Film Institute on May 6, 2015. (Photo by Jim Tuttle / Accountability Lab) By: Jim Tuttle, Accountability Lab Liberia Multi-media Fellow Liberia Film Institute’s latest class of filmmakers recently completed a series of short documentaries and dramas dealing with their country’s unprecedented Ebola outbreak. They have been screening their films in communities around the country, and a large film festival in Monrovia is being planned for late June. Here’s a look at some of the student [...]

2015-05-20T00:00:00+00:0020th May 2015|

Can filmmaking help achieve development goals?

Blair Glencorse of the Accountability Lab discusses the importance of community-driven development and how filmmaking can engage people in accountability goals. Many organizations and development professionals have found that reaching initial benchmarks is sometimes easier than sustaining them. However, with clear goals, development progress can be sustained in the long-run. According to Blair Glencorse of the Accountability Lab, setting goals that are context-specific is critical. The Accountability Lab, he says, meets “people where they are, not where we want them to be,” and takes into consideration the varying levels of literacy, numeracy, and other practical skills of their clients when designing a program. [...]

2015-04-15T00:00:00+00:0015th April 2015|

Ebola and the power of film: How my students and I saved lives by making movies

By: Divine Anderson, as told to Julia Belluz. This article was originally published by Vox. Divine Anderson runs Liberia's first and only film school, the Liberia Film Institute. The 37-year-old started making movies in 1996 and has stuck to the medium because he thinks it's the best way to reach his fellow Liberians, many of whom can't read. When the Ebola outbreak was peaking last fall, he turned his attention to creating public-health awareness films that he spread through a mobile cinema — essentially a motorcycle retrofitted with a cart that carried him, his students, and a TV. We talked [...]

2015-03-10T00:00:00+00:0010th March 2015|
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