From: kyle (email suppressed)
Date: Wed Oct 25 2006 - 12:59:02 PDT
Get out to see Bill's work!
To anyone who is not familiar with it, it's amazing. We had him out to
Denver and the audience loved the show. If you get a chance to see him, you
should go!
Cheers,
Kyle Harris
Acquisitions Manager
Free Speech TV
P.O. Box 6060
Boulder, CO 80306
p:303-542-4818
f:303-442-6472
e: email suppressed
w: html://www.freespeech.org
-----Original Message-----
From: Experimental Film Discussion List
[mailto:email suppressed]On Behalf Of Rory Brosius
Sent: Tuesday, October 24, 2006 9:58 PM
To: email suppressed
Subject: Re: Troy NY: Bill Brown "The Other Side" 8 PM 10/30/06
Bill will also travel north to Glens Falls, NY to screen "The Other Side" on
Tuesday, Oct. 31st at the Crandal Public Library. A great library, and a
good town. I encourage all who can to attend.
Cheers,
Rory
>From: Dara G <email suppressed>
>Reply-To: Experimental Film Discussion List <email suppressed>
>To: email suppressed
>Subject: Troy NY: Bill Brown "The Other Side" 8 PM 10/30/06
>Date: Tue, 24 Oct 2006 17:45:41 -0400
>
>>(Troy NY) The Capital Region premiere of "The Other Side" with film maker
>>Bill Brown takes place at The Sanctuary For Independent Media (3361 6th
>>Avenue in Troy) on Monday, October 30, 2006 at 7 PM. There will be a
>>potluck with the film maker beginning at 6 PM.
>>
>>Brown is a filmmaker from Lubbock, Texas. He has made several short
>>experimental documentaries about the dusty corners of the North American
>>landscape, which he'll be screening along with his new film "The Other
>>Side"--a 2000-mile journey along the U.S./Mexico border revealing a
>>geography of aspiration and insecurity. While documenting the efforts of
>>migrant activists to establish a network of water stations in the
>>borderlands of the southwestern U.S., Brown considers the border as a
>>landscape, at once physical, historical, and political.
>>
>>"The Other Side" attempts to document the physical landscape of the
>>borderlands, and the human landscape of cross-border migration. As
>>increasingly militant US immigration policies have sealed the traditional
>>avenues of migration from Mexico, undocumented migrants have resorted to
>>crossing the remote deserts of the Southwest. Every summer, scores of
>>people die while attempting this transit. In response, activist groups
>>from Tucson to San Diego have established a network of water stations;
>>man-made oases of plastic water bottles scattered throughout the border
>>zone. This film, in part, documents those efforts.
>>
>>Bill Brown likes to travel. Meandering across the variegated landscapes
>>of America from his home in Lubbock, Texas, the 32-year- old filmmaker has
>>visited the reputed UFO landing site in Roswell, New Mexico, and
>>traversed the lengthy Trans-Canadian Highway. He's visited decommissioned
>>missile sites in North Dakota and wandered around the hills of Point
>>Pleasant, West Virginia. But more importantly, he's made movies about his
>>travels, creating an eminently unique body of work marked by stunning
>>visuals and a personal voice, and hovering stylistically somewhere
>>between ethnographic study, idiosyncratic travelogue, and critical essay.
>>
>>Between 1988 and 1992, Brown studied filmmaking in Harvard University's
>>Visual and Environmental Studies Department, known for its emphasis on
>>"old-fashioned documentary film production," as Brown puts it, where
>>filmmakers such as Bob Gardner served as Brown's mentors. "It was exactly
>>the right sort of program for me," the filmmaker notes. "I didn't know
>>anything about nonfiction filmmaking--my experience with movies was
>>either the standard PBS- style documentary or traditional narrative films,
>>but when it became clear that there was this huge genre of essay films,
>>it was very exciting, a revelation. I'm still working through that
>>enthusiasm."
>>
>>In 1994, the filmmaker traveled west to earn his MFA in the live- action
>>filmmaking program at California Institute of the Arts where he studied
>>with James Benning, a structuralist filmmaker who shares Brown's
>>affection for the American countryside.
>>
>>"From the get-go, I was interested in landscape," confesses Brown, who
>>adds, as if it explains everything, "I'm from Texas." He continues:
>>"Landscapes are like relationships--I think I've fallen in love with
>>landscapes. Some are inspiring, and some are uninspiring. But in general
>>I guess this fascination with landscapes has to do with trying to square
>>geological history with human history, to look at all this stuff that's
>>around us and visible but mute. So I guess my ongoing project is to
>>figure out what it is about landscape that gives me goosebumps."
>>
>>Working in 16mm, often with black-and-white stock, Brown says his
>>projects begin with a question, some hook that will give him a reason to
>>visit a place and begin shooting footage of it. With Roswell (1994),
>>Brown was intrigued by New Mexico's desert vistas and the town's UFO
>>folklore. For Buffalo Common (2001), Brown chronicled the dismantling of
>>missile sites in North Dakota, alongside larger issues of war and
>>economic decline. And for his latest half-hour film supported by Creative
>>Capital, Mountain State, Brown is traipsing around West Virginia, tracing
>>the history of a local legend--The Mothman, who reputedly haunted a town
>>on the Ohio River in the 1960s.
>>
>>"There's this whole body of weird uncanny events that never make their
>>way into the traditional media - things that happen to a community or
>>town and then get forgotten," says Brown. "The creature called The
>>Mothman is a part of that." First spotted in 1964, The Mothman has been
>>described as a large, winged man in more than 100 sightings, and while
>>the figure recently graced America's movie screens in The Mothman
>>Prophecies starring Richard Gere and Laura Linney, you can bet that
>>Brown's more vernacular approach will tap directly into the eerie
>>recesses of our cultural mythology. Brown's images, which frequently show
>>the landscape void of inhabitants, are strangely evocative and embody a
>>sense of intense longing. Part of their power is that they are indeed
>>filmed images rather than video.
>>
>>"There's a certain depth and saturation to the film image that I don't
>>see in the flat, sterile video image," explains Brown. "I like grain and
>>the way the image breathes, and there's this strange organic dynamism in
>>the form of grain. I guess I fetishize the alchemy of the whole process -
>>strips of silver that are stained by light and somehow become images . .
>>. it's very magical and romantic."
>>
>>In addition to shooting beautiful, resplendent images and recording live
>>sound, Brown also speaks in voiceover. "Text and language are incredibly
>>important to me," he says. "I don't know if it's an effort to make the
>>landscape speak, some feeble attempt to give it a voice, but I haven't
>>figured out any other way to make these films without voiceover." Which
>>is a good thing, because Brown's particular voice, with its quiet tone,
>>colloquial familiarity, and moments of sublime poetic phrasing, endow his
>>films with their singular power. Indeed, to say that Brown is one of
>>America's leading new cinematic voices is true, both literally and
>>metaphorically.
>>
>>Bill Brown's visit to the Capital Region is made possible by volunteer
>>labor, small financial contributions from hundreds of patrons of The
>>Sanctuary For Independent Media, and the Central New York Programmers
>>Group in cooperation with the Experimental Television Center Presentation
>>Funds program, which is supported by the New York State Council on the
>>Arts. Admission to this screening is by donation ($10 suggested, $5
>>student/low income).
>>
>>The Sanctuary For Independent Media is a community media arts center
>>located in an historic former church in Troy, NY. The Sanctuary hosts
>>screening, production and performance facilities, training in media
>>production and a meeting space for artists, activists and independent
>>media makers of all kinds. The Sanctuary is located at 3361 6th Avenue,
>>three doors down from 101st Street in north Troy. Call (518) 272-2390,
>>email email suppressed, or visit
>>www.TheSanctuaryForIndependentMedia.org for more information.
>>
>> # # #
>>
>>Hi-res image:
>>
>>http://hm.indymedia.org/usermedia/image/10/large/TheOtherSidepcard.JPG
>>
>>Interview with Bill Brown:
>>
>>http://tinyurl.com/ybqfte
>>
>
>
>__________________________________________________________________
>For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.
_________________________________________________________________
Stay in touch with old friends and meet new ones with Windows Live Spaces
http://clk.atdmt.com/MSN/go/msnnkwsp0070000001msn/direct/01/?href=http://spa
ces.live.com/spacesapi.aspx?wx_action=create&wx_url=/friends.aspx&mkt=en-us
__________________________________________________________________
For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.
__________________________________________________________________
For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.