FIAT/IFTA World Conference 2026

This session proposes a joint field-based presentation by the Institut national de l’audiovisuel (INA, France) and the Cinemateca Brasileira, drawing on the project Crossed Perspectives France–Brazil, developed within the framework of the France–Brazil Cultural Season 2025.
The project addresses a central question for audiovisual archives worldwide: how to preserve, document, restore and provide access to audiovisual collections related to Indigenous peoples, in contexts shaped by historical asymmetries, political sensitivities and ethical responsibilities, while engaging respectfully with the communities concerned.
Based on audiovisual collections held in France and Brazil, largely produced through external viewpoints, the project initiated a process of critical reassessment of collections, re-documentation and international cooperation, in dialogue with Brazilian professionals and representatives of Indigenous communities, notably the Xokó people.
Audiovisual archives relating to Indigenous peoples are highly sensitive heritage materials, both invaluable and complex to work with. They raise intertwined challenges:

• historical North–South imbalances in the production and custody of images;
• ethical issues related to rights, consent and contemporary uses;
• documentary gaps and inadequate metadata;
• growing expectations regarding access, restitution and cultural reappropriation.

 
In this context, cooperation between a European public audiovisual archive and a major Latin American cinematheque offers a concrete opportunity to experiment with operational frameworks based on trust, mediation and co-construction. 
In this context, the presentation will consist in drawing hypothesis to the following questions :  

• How can audiovisual archives responsibly work with collections related to Indigenous peoples that were historically produced through external or unequal viewpoints?
• In what ways can ethical considerations (rights, consent, cultural sensitivity) be embedded directly into archival, technical and editorial workflows?
• What role can national institutions and international cooperation play in enabling dialogue, shared governance and sustainable decision‑making?
• Which practices developed through this France–Brazil experience are transferable to other archival contexts dealing with sensitive or marginalised memories?

The Cinemateca Brasileira: reference institution and national mediator
The Cinemateca Brasileira plays a key role in anchoring the project locally, combining archival expertise, in-depth knowledge of Brazilian legal and cultural contexts, and active dialogue with professionals and communities. It contributes to defining cooperation frameworks that are attentive to Indigenous sensitivities and national institutional realities.
INA: trusted third party and methodological facilitator
INA acts as a trusted third party, providing methodological tools for documentation, analysis and governance, while supporting the critical reassessment of collections produced outside Brazil.
 

In the global archival sector, "co-design" is frequently discussed but rarely interrogated as a force for institutional change. For the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia (NFSA), the journey toward a First Nations-led collaborative model began with a profound challenge: the preservation and repatriation of the Strehlow Collection. Containing highly sensitive, men’s-only sacred ceremonies recorded in Central Australia between 1932 and 1975, the collection’s preservation was a technical necessity but a cultural challenge.


This paper argues that the Strehlow project served as the pivotal milestone that transformed the NFSA’s own professional practice. By moving beyond the traditional model of "custodianship," the NFSA worked with the Traditional Owners to build a truly collaborative framework to appropriately preserve, digitise and repatriate the material on Country. Embedded in the process was deep respect and observation of cultural protocols, governed by a dedicated Men’s Working Group. The work was centred around strict, community-guided cultural protocols, and culminated in the deployment of a "Digital Access Studio" in Mparntwe (Alice Springs) to ensure on-Country control.


Critically, this model has not remained static. Drawing on the FIAT/IFTA theme of mutual learning, the NFSA iteratively evolved its approach—from the early lessons of the Strehlow project to further collaborations with First Nations communities across Australia. This includes a multi-year project to digitise and repatriate the archive of the Torres Strait Islander Media Association – a collection that holds decades of audiovisual material of significance to communities across the Torres Strait.


By analysing this evolution, the paper demonstrates how audiovisual archives can become true spaces of exchange, where institutional technical expertise and ancient cultural authority meet to create a more ethical, resilient, and collaborative archival future.

This presentation discusses ways in which Canada's public broadcaster is working to mobilize its vast archival legacy to support its reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples. From the digitization of archival radio shows that aired in Indigenous languages, to analyzing historical coverage for its portrayals of Indigenous stories, CBC/Radio-Canada is advancing along its reconciliation journey by surfacing the truths embedded in its audiovisual past, in collaboration with Indigenous researchers and communities.