THE DBCA
On April 3, 1975, at the auditorium of the Cinemateca of the Museum of Modern Art in Rio de Janeiro, the Abraci (Brazilian Association of Filmmakers) was founded with the main objective of forming an entity for the collection and defense of filmmakers' author’s rights.
The first board, led by Nelson Pereira dos Santos and Leon Hirszman, reached an agreement with the distributor Embrafilme – Brazilian Film Company, under which 5% of the revenue from exhibited films would be collected for the benefit of directors.
Collective Management
The DBCA aims to the collective management of Author’s Rights of Brazilian filmmakers and audiovisual directors, as well as to create and maintain a social assistance program for its members.
Agreement
This agreement ended with the dissolution of Embrafilme in 1980 by the government of Fernando Collor. However, the ideals of defending audiovisual author’s rights remained.
On two occasions, Brazilian directors revisited the idea of forming a Collective Management Society for Author’s Rights, once under the leadership of Nelson Pereira dos Santos and another in 2005, through the initiative of a group of associations.
Collaboration
Finally, in 2014, members of the Abraci board revived the original project through an invitation to visit DAC – Directores Argentinos Cinematográficos (Association of Argentine Cinematic and Audiovisual Directors) in Buenos Aires. This experience empowered and encouraged them to found the DBCA – Brazilian Directors of Cinema and Audiovisual – General Association of Brazilian Author Directors.
A Time of
Transformation
The DBCA was founded with the democratic mission of defending diversity and the ethics of offering dignity to the audiovisual director profession and promoting Brazilian audiovisual arts from the past, present, and future generations.
At a time of transformations in the production and distribution models of the audiovisual industry, where cinematic and audiovisual works are increasingly consumed through various emerging means and platforms, the union of Brazilian creators to defend and manage their author’s rights has the ultimate goal of defending and preserving the life and work of audiovisual creations.