'Liyana'

JOHNSON CITY (Feb. 5, 2018) – Pre-teen Liyana, who lives in a thatched hut in Swaziland, loses both parents to AIDS and decides to begin a sojourn across the small South African country – with only her bull sidekick and her bravery – to rescue her kidnapped twin brothers. Along the way, she crosses crocodile-infested waters, navigates the unknown wilderness and savors a swim, the sunrise and the sweetness of a juicy mango.

Liyana’s story is an original tale born in the imaginations of five orphaned children in the Kingdom of Swaziland.  The world that the children imagine for Liyana is brought to life in the film “Liyana”in an innovative style, weaving documentary scenes with the five young storytellers together with an animated adventure created by Nigerian artist Shofela Coker.

This award-winning film will be screened at East Tennessee State University on Monday, Feb. 12, at 7 p.m. in the D.P. Culp University Center’s Martha Street Culp Auditorium.  The free public screening, sponsored by the Mary B. Martin School of the Arts as part of the South Arts Southern Circuit Tour of Independent Filmmakers, will be followed by a question-and-answer session and reception with filmmakers Amanda and Aaron Kopp.

“Liyana”is the brainchild of Aaron Kopp, a native of Swaziland, and photographer/visual artist Amanda Kopp. The film took more than eight years of research, shooting, funding, editing, composing and animating, says co-director/producer Amanda. Aaron Kopp calls it “a love letter to my childhood in that beautiful African Kingdom.”

The Kopps filmed these boys at their orphanage home as they participated in a workshop led by South African author and storyteller Gcina Mhlophe.

“The real-life kids are such amazing storytellers,” Amanda Kopp says. “Their ideas for Liyana's world were described with such vitality, she became such a real character to us all.”

As the young storytellers move their fictional character forward through trial and temptation, the film periodically returns to intimate documentary scenes of the children’s lives in Swaziland — nightly rituals, herding cattle, feeding pigs and a trip to a clinic for an HIV test. These intertwining narrative strands work together to draw connections between Liyana and the children. As the real and imagined worlds begin to converge, the children must choose what kind of story they will tell, both in fiction and in their own lives.

“The use of Liyana, a fictional character created by the children, allows them a way to express both the darkest and brightest parts of who they are,” Amanda Kopp says. “And in the process, they take us on a wild/funny/sad/epic journey.”

And eventually, the line between fiction and reality begins to blur.

Achieving just the right balance of animated story and documentary was one of the most challenging parts of the eight-year process, Aaron Kopp says. Aligning just the right combination of collaborators was also a process. Animation artist Coker and composer Philip Miller, from South Africa, headline an international team of co-producers and editors.

The cinematic collaboration – the Kopps’ feature directorial debut– won the Grand Jury Award for Best Documentary at the L.A. Film Festival, the Jury Award for Artistic Bravery at the Durban International Film Festival and the Grand Prize for Documentary Feature at the Heartland Film Festival.

The subject matter of orphans, abuse, loss and illness has the potential to be a downer, but that is not the case with “Liyana,” according to Martin School of the Arts Director Anita DeAngelis.

“One might think that a group of orphan children might have very difficult stories – and they do – but they were able to come together to create this beautiful story that is then put into this unique film format,” she says. “It is actually uplifting, sometimes humorous and very much appropriate for all ages.”

For more information on the film, visit www.liyanathemovie.com.

The Southern Circuit Tour of Independent Filmmakers is a program of South Arts. Southern Circuit screenings are funded in part by a grant from South Arts in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts. South Arts, founded in 1975, is a nonprofit regional arts organization building on the South's unique heritage and enhancing the public value of the arts. Their work responds to the arts environment and cultural trends with a regional perspective through an annual portfolio of activities designed to address the role of the arts in impacting the issues important to the region, and linking the South with the nation and the world through arts.

For information about the film or ETSU Mary B. Martin School of the Arts, call 423-439-TKTS (8587) or visit www.etsu.edu/martin.  For disability accommodations, call the ETSU Office of Disability Services at 423-439-8346.