Re: Experimental films showing at various Universities

From: Adam Hyman (email suppressed)
Date: Wed Nov 26 2008 - 12:17:31 PST


I didn¹t read Steve¹s reply as speaking for Canyon...

On 11/26/08 12:01 PM, "DOMINIC ANGERAME" <email suppressed>
wrote:

> Well Steve....you have opened a can of worms.....To correct some things that
> Polta states about Canyon Cinema. When Steve worked here it was more than 8
> years ago...our Board is not passive at all...It has raised quite a bit of
> capital from private donations that has helped us stay in business...The Board
> is in the process of re vamping the website and creating a non profit
> organization for various purposes we have actively sought out international
> rentals, I have traveled and presented Canyon programs at festival such at the
> Nashville International FF, Big Muddy Film Festival, New Orleans Film
> Festival, Havana Film Festival and in the future to Japan and other
> places...too many to list here.
>
> Steve...the phone no longer rings...it is all email....I appreciated your work
> on the Board here and the two years as an employee.....however, many things
> have changed since you have left.....Canyon actively rents continuos
> projection of dvds to Museums and Galleries...
>
> I wish you would not speak for Canyon Cinema since you have not been actively
> involved for more than four years and have no idea of what is keeping us
> alive.... Instead you should be speaking for the Cinematheque that still pays
> its filmmakers a pittance (I do not think the honorarium has gone up in more
> that 15 years) for showing films to a nearly empty venue....and yet has a
> staff of three people.
>
> Dominic Angerame
> Director, Canyon Cinema
>
> --- On Wed, 11/26/08, Steve Polta <email suppressed> wrote:
>> From: Steve Polta <email suppressed>
>> Subject: Re: Experimental films showing at various Universities
>> To: email suppressed
>> Date: Wednesday, November 26, 2008, 10:51 AM
>>
>> Not to start a big fight or anything but perhaps it would behoove the
>> distribution coops to address this more directly than by posting to a
>> discussion
>> board. Yes‹‹the material conditions are changing, and loyal faculty are
>> retiring. But perhaps it would be worth the coops developing outreach
>> strategies
>> by which their collections could be "sold" to institutions. To play
>> devil's advocate here, let's ponder: "Why are these films
>> important?" "Why *should* instructors show these films to their
>> classes?" "Who really
>> cares?" Many of us on the list have
>> opinions on these questions, but these opinions are not penetrating into the
>> classrooms (other than obliquely). What can a distributor do to infiltrate
>> these
>> institutions? Creation of study guides? Convincing creation and distribution
>> of
>> information (i.e. promotional material) on collections? Assembly of rental
>> packages and possible related reader-type material? These are just ideas. The
>> co-ops' business
>> model (from what I can tell, and I worked at Canyon for three years and was
>> on
>> their board for‹‹was it four?) is, by its nature, passive‹‹essentially a
>> wait-for-the-phone-to-ring type deal, virtually no outreach or promotion of
>> collections. You can bet that such operations as text book distributors,
>> mainstream video distributors, and the more active "niche"
>> distributors (such as Newsreel and Women Make Movies) work very hard to
>> create
>> "sales tools," make phone calls and
>> otherwise talk up the
>> educational/cultural value of their holdings in an effort to "drive
>> business". While I realize the cultural forces "against us" are
>> great, in my opinion, such strategies would be something for the co-ops to
>> consider...
>>
>> Steve Polta
>>
>>
>> --- On Tue, 11/25/08, DOMINIC ANGERAME <email suppressed>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> From: DOMINIC ANGERAME <email suppressed>
>>> Subject: Experimental films showing at various Universities
>>> To: email suppressed
>>> Date: Tuesday, November 25, 2008, 1:31 PM
>>> I originally address to Gene Youngblood, however thought I
>>> would put this out there to the entire list.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Dear Gene,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I know that you have retired, however, I was curious if
>>> the
>>> person who replaced you had any experimental film
>>> inclinations.
>> Canyon
>>> no longer receives any rental requests from the College of
>>> Santa Fe and
>>> it was, until your retirement, one of our biggest
>>> renters, The
>>> unfortunate situation appears that a lot of experiment film
>>> classes or
>>> programs are mostly one person driven. Once that person
>>> retires the
>>> replacement is no longer interested in experimental cinema.
>>> I first
>>> noticed this when Dick Myers retired from Kent State. He
>>> use to rent at
>>> least $1500 a year for film screenings. Canyon has not
>>> received one
>>> film rental request since he left. The same is true for
>>> Occidental
>>> College when Chick Strand left, all rentals stopped. Stan
>>> Brakhage use
>>> to rental at least $5000 worth of experimental films from
>>> Canyon a
>>> year....now the requests from UCB have dwindled down
>>> considerably. This
>>> is the same
>> for the San Francisco Art Institute, School of
>>> the Art of
>>> Chicago, University of Oklahoma and many more places too
>>> numerous to
>>> list here.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> What I might suggest to those on the list that are still
>>> teaching and
>>> plan to retire to try and have a say about the replacement
>>> and their
>>> interest in experimental cinema. It would certainly help
>>> the field stay
>>> alive. I realize that often times teachers have no say in
>>> who their
>>> replacement will be.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Dominic Angerame
>>>
>>> Exec. Director, Canyon Cinema
>>>
>>>
>>> __________________________________________________________________
>>> For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at
>>> <email suppressed>.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> __________________________________________________________________
>> For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.
>
> __________________________________________________________________ For info on
> FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.
>
>

__________________________________________________________________
For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.