From: 40 Frames (email suppressed)
Date: Sat Jan 26 2008 - 11:37:04 PST
On 1/26/08, Ed Halter <email suppressed> wrote:
>
> [....] there are vast lacunae in the written record (at
> least in English)--but I don't think the "Canyon Cinema defense" is purely
> spurious. I think it points to the greater fact that this field is a
> rather
> small, impoverished one, and access to materials, documents and the films
> themselves is much more difficult versus commercial cinema, gallery art
> and
> other forms (although this is getting better), and only relatively
> recently
> has, say, archiving this work been taken very seriously. It's not an
> excuse,
> but I do think it is the nature of the field that has to be appreciated.
Ah, the influence of money...
Case in point, my attempts to rent from CFMDC have been met with the request
for payment up front. Rarely
something our tiny, no budget organization can agree to. Canyon and FMC by
comparison permit has to pay after
the date of the program. Then there is the additional cost of having prints
cross the border.
When we've shown Canadian work (Alex MacKenzie, Barbara Sternberg, Joyce
Wieland, Jack Chambers, etc) the maker
has either brought their work as part of a tour (usually being granted
travel funds from Canada Council), or in the case of deceased makers, prints
have been rented from US distributors. This is nothing I am proud of... for
example, the print of Hart of London I would have preferred come directly
from CFMDC, as the prints have been recently struck.
We have thought about Dutch work (hey, Amanda hope your enjoying it over
there, don't forget about us...), German, sorry
Heinz, Japanese, as well as our Southern neighbors (what are they up to do
there), but the research (time) and borders, land and
sea, create some rather large barriers. It's one thing when you do this work
40 hours a week, quite another when you can only
devote maybe 5 hours a week.
40 Frames is one organization in town that is, after all, doing the
work that larger and better funded film and art institutions in this
fine city of ours... are failing to do.
-Alain
-- > 40 FRAMES > Alain LeTourneau > Pamela Minty > 425 SE 3rd #400 > Portland, OR 97214 > United States > > +1 503 231 6548 > info(at)40frames(dot)org > http://www.40frames.org __________________________________________________________________ For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.