Organizers of the Docs Port Incheon announced that they will stop activities.

Launched in 2014 the Docs Port Incheon was an Asian documentary project market that introduced the best documentaries in Korea and Asia. Each year the festival shown projects from talented Asian filmmakers. The DPI held pitch sessions, sale & distribution meetings, industry talks, and Master Classes with different professionals.

Many good projects were featured at the DPI such as “206 Unearthed” by Heo Cheo-nyung, “The Trials of My Body” by Lee Ko-woon, “A War of Memories” by Leekil Bo-ra, “For Vagina’s Sake” by Kim Bo-ram, “Counters” by Lee Il-ha, “Bamseom Pirates Seoul Inferno” by Jung Yoon-suk and “My Daughter’s Toe Walking” by Kwon Woo-jung, to name a few.

But not all are bad news for Asian filmmakers, despite the closure of this program the DMZ International Documentary Film Festival is going to set up a program like the Docs Port Incheon. The “DMZ Industry” promises to be the next hub for documentary filmmakers who search for grants, funds and distribution opportunities. You can read more about this in our latest article: DMZ Industry 2019

Official Statement of the Docs Port Incheon:

Dear documentary comrades in Asia,
Hereby we reluctantly announce that Incheon Film Commission will not continue to host Docs Port Incheon. This is very sad and disappointing for us to tell this. But we know well it will disappoint you documentary makers much more.

DPI was launched in 2014 with great success and had the 5th edition last year. Almost every Korean documentary filmmaker welcome it and participated enthusiastically from the very beginning. Asian filmmakers have been also greatly keen to be a part of DPI. To help realize their dreams, DPI team have done their best to secure every available resource. And not a few people and companies came to join the efforts. From post-production companies to cinemas, funds and investors, broadcasters, marketers, sound labs, film festivals and even music composers held out their hands. Accordingly, many of the outstanding projects have been cultivated and supported through DPI and made great achievements. We feel greatly proud of them.

But we have to say that we recognized the fact that we cannot keep doing these wonderful things anymore. Securing all the resources, managing workforces in due way, balancing every program that Incheon Film Commission is doing, all these things have been always big challenges to us. Furthermore, the general manager Seokpil KANG has serious health issues so that he should take a long break. Considering all these things seriously, we finally reached a conclusion that we cannot hold DPI in the future. Greatly sorry for this.

But never to be too much disappointed please. Even though we stop here, another good arena is coming. It’ll be probably even bigger. It is DMZ　Docs Industry. They will launch a new forum which is so comprehensive that all the programs that DPI　has done will be included in the scheme. We feel a bit relieved with this. You will be able to find out good chances there to realize your dreams.

We wish you all good luck and hope to meet again at another places.

Docs Port Incheon Team