Elisa Bajares Chocron discusses her brilliant short film ‘Representation’.
As a first year Media and Communications student, I was mostly looking forward to
being able to show my creativity through my assignments, and a great opportunity
presented itself in the MS-126 module: ‘creative media platforms’.
The final assignment for this module was creating a portfolio of all our work so far to showcase our skills
through a range of media texts such as podcasts, short-form video, and photography.
I knew that this was chance to create something meaningful as well as personal to me,
and for this I chose to delve into different forms of representation in the media— How it
is received, what can be changed, and most importantly, what it means to people.
It was a topic that had intrigued me all through a level, and being a queer Latina myself,
the idea of seeing someone just like me on a big screen was something quite rare
growing up.
Therefore, for this portfolio, I created a short video titled ‘Representation’ which explored London’s queer scene and highlighted the importance of inclusivity in the media.
Visuals include footage of modern as well as more historical gay community spaces in and around London, such as Gay’s the Word, the UK’s oldest LGBT bookshop, set up in 1979; and Queer Britain, the UK’s first (and only) LGBTQ+ museum.
Places like these are essential to the community and provide a save space full of knowledge and so much history, which is imperative that we keep alive. I would highly recommend visiting and supporting these establishments; getting to know them, and the people that
worked there, was a very emotional and joyful experience.
Outside of Gay’s the Word, I also spoke to three young people as well as some close
friends “what does representation meant to you?”. It’s a loaded, and simultaneously
slightly vague question but the way in which they all interpreted it was interesting.
From the first time they saw themselves in certain characters, to the online communities that
they were a part of growing up, I learnt that the innate human behaviours and feelings of
empathy and relatability are something we all crave and look to media for.
Putting the video together was the easy part as I had felt so inspired by everything I had learnt and
heard. It was vitally important to include real, young queer voices and to let their words
and experiences tell the story.
It was such a surprise and honour when senior lecturer, Dr. Lisa Smithstead reached
out, wanting me to show ‘Representation’ at her event for Swansea Pride, ‘A Queer
History of Cinema in 10 LGBTQI+ Moments’ at the Taliesin Create.
The event was fantastic and extremely informative as Lisa walked the audience through the history of
gay representation in film, from the first recorded audio-visual ‘short film’ to big,
academy award-wining, modern movies; it discussed the importance of inclusivity and
highlighted specific breakthroughs and milestones in the film industry for queer artists.
Showing my video to conclude the presentation was incredible, and truly showed me
how I would not have been able to do that without all the amazing creatives that had
been discussed.
After the talk there were light refreshments and the opportunity to discuss what we had
seen, as well as a ‘memories wall’, where visitors could write their favourite moments
from their own viewing experience, which became in itself a celebration of queer joy.
I was moved to find that people really resonated with the video and wanted to discuss it
further and share their own stories with me based on what they had seen and heard in
‘Representation’.
Overall it was a fantastic experience and I feel very grateful to my lecturers, Nick Ridd,
Hannah Thompson-Radford and Dr Lisa Smithstead for believing in my project and
offering me these great opportunities.
A real line from my personal statement that I wrote a little over a year ago today reads, “My goal in university is to further explore the power of media and learn how to create a touching and moving piece of text.”
I feel very proud to have achieved that in my first year at Swansea University.