KIRI DALENA: I’ve been making films since I was eighteen. From making documentaries, I saw that it was the best or most efficient way to respond to contemporary issues and ongoing present-day situations. That’s why my works in the last twenty years have been mostly documentaries as well as short films.

I was born to a family of artists. My father is a painter and my mother is a sculptor. But when I was growing up I decided that I wanted to pursue something different. I became involved in activism.

For Erased Slogans, I took photojournalistic images taken during that period before martial law was declared. When martial law was declared in 1972, all of the newspapers were closed down and all of these protest actions and strikes became illegal and had to disappear.

When I had those photographs within my reach, I decided to erase the words from these banners and placards. When I was deleting it, then I saw also that it meant many other things. It meant forgetting that period [had] transpired. But then when I started to show it to other people, it had another meaning for them. It gave them the impulse to try to remember.

I’m still surprised when it’s received well or even understood outside of the country, because a lot of the issues here are issues which I also feel I’m still trying to understand or figure out. I have understood that change will not necessarily come in my lifetime. It can take generations to really achieve change. It’s a long haul for all of us.