The Art and Culture Center/Hollywood has been awarded a $15,000 Art and Culture Grant from Our Fund Foundation to produce the documentary film short Open Dialogues: Student Voices, based on the coming-out narratives of LGBTQ high school and college students in South Florida.
Student Voices will be the fourth film in the Center’s award-winning Open Dialogues series. For this production, the Center is partnering with Safe Schools South Florida to select area students who will share their coming-out stories in on-camera interviews and performances. Student Voices is targeted for release in the spring of 2023.
“The Center is thrilled to receive an Art and Culture Grant from Our Fund Foundation for our Open Dialogues documentary film Student Voices,” said Joy Satterlee, the Center’s Executive Director. “We look forward to partnering with Safe Schools South Florida to give voice to the diverse coming-out stories of LGBTQ youth as we work to inspire greater equity and inclusion in community.”
This is the first grant the Art and Culture Center/Hollywood has been awarded by Our Fund, which promotes philanthropy, manages enduring investments, and conducts impactful grant-making to improve the lives of LGBTQ people in South Florida.
It is also the first time the Center has partnered with Safe Schools South Florida, which works to create safer schools where all students can learn and thrive, regardless of real or perceived sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression, their own or that of their parents/guardians.
Open Dialogues: Student Voices will be directed, photographed, and edited by Miami-based filmmaker Freddy Rodriguez, who has helmed two Open Dialogues films thus far for the Center, the 2022 release Black Voices | Black Stories and 2020’s Stories From the LGBTQ Community. A third film, Stories of Allyship, is slated for production in October 2022 with a February 2023 release date.
Black Voices | Black Stories and Stories From the LGBTQ Community are currently on view by request in the Community Gallery at the Center, located at 1650 Harrison Street. These films are also available for public screenings and discussions with partnering organizations. For more information, visit www.artandculturecenter.org, or call 954.921.3274.