A second $10,000 award is granted to the Iranian filmmaker Hamed Zolfaghari for his project Eye of the Desert

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

Shafie Abad is a small desert village in South Central Iran where traditions are fundamental. In this desert area, it seems that little has changed in decades. But one day, six young women are given cameras. They learn to use them and start a struggle to improve their daily lives. Enthused by its success, the group creates a cooperative for their handcrafts and films the process while they tackle issues of social freedoms and traditional restrictions. It becomes the starting point of a collective action, a cooperative of filmmaker/weaver women who free themselves. Through the handheld cameras, they discover their thirst for freedom and learn to change their conditions by changing their point of view. But their work stirs controversy in the otherwise sleepy village and the women are confronted with an outcry against their filming from conservative community members.