Carol Leigh

Since the dawn of cinema, sex workers have served as muses to movie-makers. Cinematic sex workers are often fantasy figures, or cautionary tales, or just punchlines. Even in well-meaning documentaries reality is distorted by filmmakers who are determined to show trauma, violence and pathos rather than the resilient and thriving communities that are the norm for many sex workers. The Celluloid Bordello brings sex workers to the cinema. With equal parts historical overview, critique, and homage, this eye-opening film lets real-life dommes, escorts, porn stars and hustlers tell you which films they love and which they hate, which get it right and which miss the mark, and, most importantly, how perpetuating stereotypes in media affects real peoples' lives.

For the 2016 Day With(out) Art, Visual AIDS presents COMPULSIVE PRACTICE, a video compilation of compulsive, daily, and habitual practices by nine artists and activists who live with their cameras as one way to manage, reflect upon, and change how they are deeply affected by HIV/AIDS. This hour-long video program will be distributed internationally to museums, art institutions, schools and AIDS organizations.

Mutantes sheds light on a feminism that was little talked about in France. This documentary comprises of a series of interviews conducted in the USA, Paris and Barcelona, and documents from the archives about the political action of sex workers, queer activists and post-pornographic performances.

"Ni Coupables, ni victimes" ("Not Guilty, Not Victims") is a polyphonic conversation gathering the words of some of the protagonists at the European Conference on Sex Work, Human Rights, Labour and Migration, Brussels (2005). They speak of the complexity and nuances of the sex industry and their lives: the challenges and the struggles of being a sex worker in Europe today, the repressive policies affecting their lives, and the strategies of resistance enabling them to do their work, build their desires and plan their futures.

Documentary film diary tracing Annie Sprinkle's and society’s 30 year evolution throughout the sexual revolution. Take a look at the history of porn via Annie's filmography.

Documentary that highlights 18 women and covers a period of time from the 50's to the 90's. The women chosen were selected because they represent the real diversity within both feminism and independent film and video. They range in age from 65 to 25. They are black, white, Puerto Rican, Yugoslavian, Asian American, biracial. They are straight, gay and bisexual. What they share is a need to express their own interpretations of what American culture is and could be and a belief that this work is made particularly powerful through the media.

An experimental documentary, this work is unique as it portrays the injustices of the California prison system as seen through the eyes of HIV+ women incarcerated in this system. "Blind Eye To Justice" was named by Twillah Wallace, a current inmate and HIV+ woman. Animation and found footage create a powerful montage that evokes the atmosphere in women's prisons--the violations as well as the hope and courage of prison activists who fight quietly, and from the inside. As well as documenting the experience of many women including Patti Contrerras, Blind Eye To Justice educates audiences by providing an overview of the issues of human rights for HIV+ women caught in the criminal justice system.

This documentary of the 1989 World Whores' Summit in San Francisco features prostitutes and activists from around the globe discussing human rights as they effect prostitutes.