Archive for the ‘funding’ Category

Hi All.

I apologize for the sparse postings the past couple of weeks. I’ve been slammed with school work at the end of the semester (I’m studying Media Management at the New School). I’ll share some of the wealth of my newly acquired knowledge soon, but in the meantime, here are some dance film/video events coming up this month.

Next Tuesday, December 11th
Dance Film Lab
@ South 4th Bar in Williamsburg
90 South 4th Street @ Berry
Subways: L at Bedford, J,M,Z at Marcy Ave.
Phone: 718.218.7478
8pm, free

The bi-monthly Dance Film Lab is a friendly gathering of folks interested in dance for the camera. People share their works (in any stage of progress) and get constructive feedback from the group. We all get to share who we are, what we’re doing, and what we need (which often gets miraculously granted!). And our gracious moderator Zach Morris (of Third Rail Projects blog) always makes everyone feel very warm and welcome. So come out, but shoot an email Zach first just so he knows you’re coming.

Last night I attended the DANCE MOViES Commission workshop run by my friend Hélène Lesterlin, dance curator at EMPAC (Experimental Media Performing Arts Center) in Troy, NY. It was a very inspiring presentation about the commission and the possibilities for creative experimentation in dance and media at EMPAC. The ratio of commission awards to applicants is very low, however I think it is still well worth applying to, for the process alone, and also to show the funding community that there are a lot of American artists out there that want to make dance for screen. Eventually other funders will sign on and join EMPAC’s efforts to support this fantastic genre. So Viva EMPAC and DANCE MOViES!

There is a wonderful festival in the Netherlands this month that I wish I could attend, called Dancing on the Edge: Confronting Dance from the Middle East. It’s a dance festival with a dance film component curated by Cinedans. The dance films are all from the Middle East, or made by artists from there, and tackle many topics from “West Bank Story” – a remake of the famous musical with competing Falafel stands and a taboo Israeli Palestinian love affair – to  “Horizon of Exile” a breath-taking installation about two Iraqi women torn between their country and their need to escape. Incidentally “Horizon of Exile” will be shown this January in New York during the Dance On Camera Festival. I can’t wait to see it!

So if you are in the Netherlands or thereabouts I highly recommend you check this festival out.

Dancing on the Edge
Confronting Dance from the Middle East
Amsterdam: 12-16 december
Rotterdam: 13-18 december
Groningen: 11-12 & 18-19 december

And to leave you with some moving images to muse over, my friend Hope Hall, a filmmaker, and occasional dance filmmaker, hipped me to this blog, La Blogotheque, where she shot one of their videos in the TakeAway Series. Essentially they shoot a band performing in some non-traditional space all in one take, and then post the take on their blog. Seems like a great idea for a videodance series too.

This is one of those TakeAways, and while it’s really a music video, it does have some adorable dancing, and it’ll make you want to move. So take it away!

I just added a new page called Dance Film Submission Deadlines on the upper-right side bar listing up-coming festival and funding deadlines for submissions. I’ll try to keep this list up-dated frequently, but let me know about other opportunities I may have missed by sending me an email or commenting here.

Below are up-coming deadlines:

DECEMBER 2007

Fifth Annual Sans Souci Festival of Dance Cinema
Boulder, CO USA
call for entries
Deadlines December 21, 2007 and January 18, 2008
Festival dates: April 4 and 5, 2008

Sans Souci, an international festival of dance cinema, screens short works that integrate dance with cinematic elements. We have an expansive definition of dance and an appreciation for highly experimental and interdisciplinary forms, including mixed-media works that incorporate live performance.

Entry fees: $25 and $40 for the early and final deadlines respectively
Visit http://www.sanssoucifest.org/ for more details and a downloadable entry form.
Submissions are encouraged from all artists regardless of credentials and affiliations.

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In follow-up to my post about EMPAC’s fabulous DANCE MOViES Commission, below is a new announcement from Hélène Lesterlin, EMPAC’s Dance Curator, about a series of free workshops she will be holding in LA, Buenos Aires and New York in November and December. These workshops are designed to help artists prepare strong proposals to EMPAC and other grant-making foundations to fund new dance film/video/installation projects. With so few grants specifically earmarked for videodance, this is a rare opportunity every dance filmmaker in North and South America should take advantage of.

November:  DANCE MOViES Commission WORKSHOPS
led by EMPAC’s Dance Curator Hélène Lesterlin

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I’ve always loved Madonna, maybe because I intuitively knew she was more of a dancer than a musician, or maybe because her music is made to dance to. In any event, the recent news of her move to leave her record label and sign a lucrative deal with the concert promoter Live Nation, struck me as a something that we dancers should perhaps take note of.

The music industry has officially come full circle with recordings. Before recording technology existed the music business was completely based on live shows and sheet music. Recordings changed all of this as major record labels grew to control the field and artists toured mostly to promote and sell their records, not the other way around. Now in the age of digital downloads, the exchange of recorded music has become ubiquitous and uncontrollable to the point where recordings are literally worth nothing. As Michael Arrington of Tech Crunch theorized “unless governments are willing to take drastic measures to protect the industry (such as a mandatory music tax), economic theory will win out and the price of music will fall towards zero.” He goes on to say that this is opening up a lot of new lucrative revenue streams for music including sales of live music tours, limited edition physical recordings (box sets and the like), and merchandise. Now we are in the midst of a huge sea change in which music recordings have no intrinsic value besides being a great promotional tool for live acts. Madonna’s move to bank on her kick-ass touring show with Live Nation over a tenuous record deal with Warner Brothers is the latest proof of this trend. (And this at the age of 49! Dancers in particular can’t help but respect this woman.)

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Hélène Lesterlin, dance curator of EMPAC (Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center) at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) has sent out a call for proposals for the 2008 DANCE MOViES Commission. Last year was the first year of this amazing and innovative program to commission 3-5 new videodance pieces by North or South American artists. I know of only one other commissioning program of this type in the Americas, and that is Bravo FACT! in Canada, which is only open to Canadian artists. EMPAC is filling a great need for the videodance community, and hopefully it will become a model for other funding organizations to emulate.

The competition is tough (last year only 4 proposals out of 163 were chosen), however the rewards are great including a cash grant, screening opportunities, and in late 2008 when their new building is complete artists may also receive valuable creative residency time using their state of the art facilities. The deadline for proposals is February 15, 2008. Guidelines and information are below:

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