Ballad for Syria

Eda Elif Tibet is an independent documentary film maker, an anthropologist from Istanbul and currently a PhD candidate (at the UNI Bern, Switzerland, 2019), she holds an MPhil degree on Social Anthropology from the University of Kent (UK, 2013). In her films, Tibet undertakes an ethnographic effort to illuminate the singularity of human becoming she documents how new intersections and imagination can sometimes against all odds propel unexpected futures. Both in her publications and films, Tibet explores and advocates for the notions of agency in relation to transformation factoring in survival and independence during times of rigid border formations that are currently taking shape throughout the world. In the premises of shared and co creative explorations, she aims for social change and therefore her understanding of filmmaking is against to all sorts of hierarchical representations or power relations. Advocating for the decolonisation of social sciences, she films and directs together with the people who's lives are under stake and being mirrored. Her most recent award wining films that circulated around the world film festivals, museums and universities are all produced and directed under her independent label, Karma Motion : Refugee Here I am (2015), directed together with Enzo Ikah, political refugee and human rights activist from DRC / Gold Human Rights Award 2015. Ballad for Syria (2017) , directed together with Maisa Alhafez from Syria, award for free speech from Calcutta Cult film festival India and Award of recognition by Independent Hollywood Documentary Film Festival in the US. And her previous films advocates for local livelihood rights and bio cultural diversity in conservation practices, that take place in her native land Cappadocia in Turkey 28 Days on the Moon (2012/ broadcast by IZ TV), the Mediterranean mountains where she followed the migration journey of the nomadic pastoralists and their five hundred goats Hey Goat! (2014 / Award for Best environmental film by Slovenia EKOTOPFILM), and in the Himalayas of Ladakh on the revitalisation of Tibetan medicine and the protection of its practitioners locally called as Amchis for a more sustainable public health model in the region, “AMCHI” (2013 / broadcast by IZ TV and Award for filmmaker of inspiration by Jakarta film festival).