Welcome to the 2017 edition

Menene Gras Balaguer
Director of the Asian Film Festival. Barcelona

Asian Film Festival. Barcelona (2017), an annual event organized by Casa Asia, is based on the cultural turn of geography and the emphasis that critical geography places on the construction of imagery directly related to the territory, starting from the underlying symbiosis between nation and narration. Asian cinema does not form a uniform set of paradigms nor does it present a unique identity panorama, as witnessed by the different stories from the countries that will be part of the festival from Central Asia and Southeast Asia to Oceania. This area covers the former Soviet republics of Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan; Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, Nepal,  Sri Lanka, Bhutan, China, Mongolia, Hong Kong, Korea, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Cambodia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia, Australia and New Zealand. Within the distance of 12.000 km that separates from East to West the boundaries of this vast extension, you go through the geographical and cultural borders of more than twenty countries, which claim a local identity in defence of their difference and against the cultural globalization that portrays the current worldwide order. This festival specialized in Asian cinema aims to become an event of international reference, with more than a hundred films to be seen in this edition, which empower us to map the cultures from which they come and represent.