Imprints, Documents, Fictions is the first monograph devoted to the work of filmmaker and artist Alia Syed.

Published by Courtisane festival in collaboration with Open City Documentary Festival, the volume situates Syed’s practice within expanded documentary, experimental cinema and postcolonial image discourse.

The book includes newly commissioned essays by Jemma Desai, Inga Fraser, Peter Gidal, Rahila Haque, Salima Hashmi, Anjana Janardhan, Ruth Noack and Henrietta Williams, alongside writing by Syed herself.

The publication examines Syed’s filmic language, her engagement with memory, displacement and diasporic narratives, and her method of working across documentary and fiction. It functions both as critical study and as a platform for contextualising her moving-image practice within contemporary experimental film culture.