The Works：German Film Festival KINO, #resist & in our studio: singer-songwriter Olivier Cong

From films like “Metropolis”, “Nosferatu” and “The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari” to the movies of Douglas Sirk, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Wim Wenders, Werner Herzog, and more, German cinema has not only made a name for itself in the international movie scene, but also had many effects on the Hollywood mainstream. As a nation, Germany has undergone huge upheavals over the past 100 years. Its filmmakers have reflected them, from the cabarets of the Weimar Republic, through two World Wars, and division by the Berlin Wall, to its current highly influential position in the European Union. Its serious filmmakers have rarely shied away from unsparing examination of the country’s social and political changes.
This year’s KINO German Film Festival, organised by the Goethe Institut is bringing in ten films that represent the recent trends in German cinema and German society and tackle topics such as homeland and identity, love and friendship, sorrow and loss.
Turing away from the big screen, a satellite exhibition of this year’s Microwave International New Media Arts Festival, #resist is featuring a number of video works by artists from India, Israel, Iraq, Germany and Hong Kong. The focus of the works, as the name suggests, is civil disobedience, a form of protest that’s gaining new impetus in many countries as their governments drift to the right and to authoritarian structures.
Freespace Happening is a series of outdoor programmes and festivals organised by the West Kowloon Cultural District. Previously the events, which included outdoor cinema, concerts, handicraft markets, pop-up stores, DIY workshops, literature activities and dance, took place in West Kowloon’s Nursery Park. This week, and up to 5th Novermber, Freespace is moving into a different environment and into the more built up and commercial setting in and around Taikoo Place. Some eighty local and overseas artists will be performing in some unexpected places and at some unexpected times, both during the day and in the evenings. One of those performers will be singer-songwriter Olivier Cong. Olivier is a young singer-songwriter who began writing his own songs while studying in the United Kingdom. He’s influenced by the music of Leonard Cohen, Damien Rice, and Radiohead, and others. He’s performed in London, Prague, Berlina and Amsterdam among other places. Last year you might have caught him at Clockenflap. If you missed him there, you can catch him here just a little later. He’ll be chatting to Billy Lee, presenter of our sister show 藝坊星期天.