3 Oct 2013 | News and features
Zarganar is Burma’s leading comedian and an accomplished poet, writer, and director who throughout his career has used his artistic talents to draw attention to political repression in Burma.
Zarganar was first arrested in 1988 following the pro-democracy demonstrations, in which he played a leading role. As reading and writing were forbidden in his cell in Insein Prison, he mixed dust from the bricks in his cell with water and wrote poetry on the floor, committing the poems to memory and sweeping away the evidence. He was freed after six months.
He was arrested again in 1990 while making jokes at a political rally, and was returned to Insein, where he spent five years in solitary confinement.
Following his release, he was increasingly involved in social activism and worked closely with international NGOs. During the ‘Saffron Revolution’ of 2007, Zarganar was one of the key figures to lead public support. This led to a further three weeks in detention.
Zarganar’s arrest in June 2008 resulted from his criticism of the Cyclone Nargis relief effort. He had personally organised support from the Burmese arts community and oversaw its delivery to the delta. He was angered by the neglect and corruption he encountered and spoke out about this in interviews. In November 2008, he was convicted of ‘public order offences’ and sentenced to 59 years in prison, later reduced to 35 years.
In late 2008, Zargana was moved to Myitkyina Prison in northern Burma, 1,500km from his family home. Zarganar was awarded the inaugural PEN/Pinter Prize for an International Writer of Courage in 2009. He was release from prison in October 2011.
Untitled
by Zargana
Translated by Vicky Bowman
It’s lucky my forehead is flat
Since my arm must often rest there.
Beneath it shines a light I must invite
From a moon I cannot see
In Myitkyina.
Listen to Index’s Free Speech Bites Podcast interview here
25 Sep 2013 | Uncategorized
Nelson Mandela’s legacy has been “too easily dismissed”, South African editor Nic Dawes tells Index on Censorship magazine in the latest issue.
In an interview for the magazine, Dawes, who has just left his job as editor at South Africa’s Mail & Guardian for a new job at the Hindustan Times, said: “His legacy is being brought back to us.”
South Africa was going through a phase when the people who brought us press freedom “now seek to restrict it”.
“We are going through a very classical process, what happens when a liberation movement has been in power for a while and starts to see its hegemony challenged and then reaches for a convenient lever to limit that challenge.”
Read the full interview with Nic Dawes in the new issue of Index on Censorship magazine.
Listen to the podcast below or click here.
10 Apr 2013 | Newswire
Artists came together with political leaders, journalists, academics and lawyers for two days of presentations and discussion on Art of Transition Symposium in Rangoon on 30-31 March.
The programme was another in the series of firsts as the space for expression in Burma opens up.
Of course, this freedom is still a work in progress. The conference had a visit from an official who asked politely how things were going, and Index was told there were a couple of undercover government agents present, who kept an eye on who was saying what.
Some of the most respected artists in the country spoke, including film-maker Min Thin Ko Ko Kyi — who produced the Art of Freedom Film Festival last year with Zarganar and Aung San Suu Kyi — poet Zeyar Lin, who represented Myanmar in Poetry Parnassus as part of the Cultural Olympiad in London, and performance artists Moe Satt, Ma Ei and Aye Ko.
Zarganar, comedian, film-maker and partner of the symposium gave the opening and closing speeches; U Win Tin, patron of the National League for Democracy, and Min Ko Naing, a leading voice in the Generation 88 group, gave the key note speeches on the first and second days respectively.
One of the key questions the symposium asked was how the reforms had affected artists who had developed a nuanced and subtle vocabulary to circumvent censorship. For some it is difficult to find their bearings; several poets admitted it would take time, maybe two years, to make work under such different conditions.
One speaker claimed that poets were being criticised for sounding more like journalists than poets, that the subtlety of their voice had been lost. Another said that he did not want to publish his poems that had been banned in the past because they would no longer be of the moment. Another artist, who had created hundreds of artworks in prison, said that he felt his most free when he was behind bars.
Some of the younger artists Index spoke to felt very differently about the influence of new reforms. They welcomed the openness, the free exchange of ideas, particularly online.
A young performance artist said that her art form was now considered “sexy” and she had plenty of invitations to perform so opening up her work to new audiences. An established poet said that poets have to be more accountable now for what they write. Previously, when all work had to be passed by the censors, the decision about what was published was completely out of the writer’s hands.
As the first symposium of its kind in the country it was necessarily experimental and as much as anything about finding a Burmese way to have a conversation about artistic freedom in public.
Index is producing a short documentary which will be translated into English. An English language podcast is also in production.
Julia Farrington is head of arts at Index on Censorship
10 Apr 2013 | Uncategorized
Artists came together with political leaders, journalists, academics and lawyers for two days of presentations and discussion on Art of Transition Symposium in Rangoon on 30-31 March.
The programme was another in the series of firsts as the space for expression in Burma opens up.
Of course, this freedom is still a work in progress. The conference had a visit from an official who asked politely how things were going, and Index was told there were a couple of undercover government agents present, who kept an eye on who was saying what.
Some of the most respected artists in the country spoke, including film-maker Min Thin Ko Ko Kyi — who produced the Art of Freedom Film Festival last year with Zarganar and Aung San Suu Kyi — poet Zeyar Lin, who represented Myanmar in Poetry Parnassus as part of the Cultural Olympiad in London, and performance artists Moe Satt, Ma Ei and Aye Ko.
Zarganar, comedian, film-maker and partner of the symposium gave the opening and closing speeches; U Win Tin, patron of the National League for Democracy, and Min Ko Naing, a leading voice in the Generation 88 group, gave the key note speeches on the first and second days respectively.
One of the key questions the symposium asked was how the reforms had affected artists who had developed a nuanced and subtle vocabulary to circumvent censorship. For some it is difficult to find their bearings; several poets admitted it would take time, maybe two years, to make work under such different conditions.
One speaker claimed that poets were being criticised for sounding more like journalists than poets, that the subtlety of their voice had been lost. Another said that he did not want to publish his poems that had been banned in the past because they would no longer be of the moment. Another artist, who had created hundreds of artworks in prison, said that he felt his most free when he was behind bars.
Some of the younger artists Index spoke to felt very differently about the influence of new reforms. They welcomed the openness, the free exchange of ideas, particularly online.
A young performance artist said that her art form was now considered “sexy” and she had plenty of invitations to perform so opening up her work to new audiences. An established poet said that poets have to be more accountable now for what they write. Previously, when all work had to be passed by the censors, the decision about what was published was completely out of the writer’s hands.
As the first symposium of its kind in the country it was necessarily experimental and as much as anything about finding a Burmese way to have a conversation about artistic freedom in public.
Index is producing a short documentary which will be translated into English. An English language podcast is also in production.
Julia Farrington is head of arts at Index on Censorship
