Press
FFFF'S LOST MEDIA ARCHIVE ON CHANNEL 2 NEWS (UTAH)
Interviewed by Peter Rosen, Blair Sterrett and Tyrone Davies explain the LMA, one of the FFFF's current projects.
1: the video is now on youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtHqQqegmXw
2: also on the channel 2 site:
http://kutv.com/video/?id=27502@kutv.dayport.com
(we're not sure how long this one will be active)
3: more at Peter Rosen's Blog:
http://kutv.com/peterrosen
Celebrating the Films of Yesteryear
by Jeremy Mathews
"I remember them, but I'm sure current generations of kids aren't seeing them anymore," said Tyrone Davies, who curates the "Out/Ex" film series, a monthly program of fringe film and video at No Brow Coffee and Tea Company, sponsored by Trasa Urban Arts Collective. This Saturday's installment, "One Frame at a Time," is both a tribute to the outdated, the kitchsy and the absurd incarnations of these strips and an overview of the recent work of Brian Dewan, an artist who, in his own, unmistakable way, has been performing CPR on this dead art form.
The two syllables of the series' title represent "outsider" and "experimental," which Davies sees as two fascinating forms of motion pictures that the mainstream routinely overlooks. Experimental filmmakers consciously push the boundaries of conventional movies. Meanwhile, untrained outsider artists aren't necessarily trying to break away from the mainstream, but they can't help but create bizarre, uncalculated artworks. One such outsider piece, shown at a previous "Out/Ex" collection featuring religious videos, is a Christian cable access show about a pirate named Captain Hook, who hooks kids into the way of Christ.
Davies pulls the experimental material from submissions to his touring Free Form Film Festival, and taps Blair Sterrett's Lost Media Archives (LMA) for the bulk of archival outsider material. The LMA's collection, which was on display as part of Davies and Sterrett's first show at No Brow on Jan. 13, includes everything from wax cylinders - Thomas Edison's original audio format - to eight-track tapes to obscure corporate videos.
Davies' concept for the program, now in its fifth month, is to alternate each program between outsider and experimental programs. But this month is a bit different, and will include Sterrett 's selection of archival strips as well as New York-based artist Dewan's re-imagining of the medium.
A Renaissance man, Dewan has a number of job descriptions on his resumé: illustrator, furniture designer, songwriter, inventor of electronic instruments, etc. "He'll do things that are traditional in a sense, but are very experimental in another sense," said Davies. "With his music, he will compose these things that are definitely folk songs and maybe they'll have very typical structure ... but then he'll do it with electronic instruments."
Dewan brings a great level of artistry and oddity to the forgotten filmstrip medium.
H is lushly illustrated and dramatically scored educational presentations and fairy tales mount in absurdity with each frame, becoming more and more hilarious and/or baffling. Some, like the story of independent filmmakers he made for the Sundance Channel, start off perplexing and go from there.
Equally unexplainable are the original relics that will put Dewan's work in perspective. "Anytime you show a filmstrip, it's not insider - it's not a media form that's 'in' at this time," Davies said, adding that some filmstrips are interesting, funny or odd because of the decades that have past, while some never had an ounce of normal in them. "Some of the favorites of mine," he said, "I'll see them and think, 'Who made this and what were they thinking?' "
The LMA's collection came largely from donations from the Provo School district. Sterrett went to different schools and asked their librarians to donate materials they planned to throw out. Sometimes he received garbage bags full of filmstrips. "There are hundreds. And there are different formats. I've never counted them and I'm still trying to catalogue them. There are way too many for me to watch on my own."
For the upcoming program, Sterrett has been combing his archives for highlights, like a '70s filmstrip on "Thinking Machines." "I love this one because of all the old technologies that it shows," he said. "Like, the air conditioner knob on your wall is a robot that is only used for one purpose and it doesn't look like a human."
While the material may seem out there to many, it's Davies and Sterrett's idea of a normal day's viewing. "I'm more fascinated by things I find in the garbage from our past than things that are coming out today," Sterrett said. It's certainly cheaper than a Saturday night at the movies (and yes, "One Frame at a Time" is free).
On the Boundary: OUT/EX
by Shawn Rossiter
In February, Salt Lake witnessed the inauguration of a new monthly film series, OUT/EX, presented by The Pickle Company's Artists-in-Residence, Loaf-i Productions, in collaboration with Lost Media Archive. Hosted by Nobrow Coffee (in the former Kayo Gallery space) on the third Saturday of every month, OUT/EX will alternate each month between outsider and experimental film from around the world to bring a broad palette of rare and unconventional cinema to Utah residents.
Tyrone Davies, of Loaf-i Productions, was encouraged by the first screening. "Our last show was pretty well attended and I got some really positive feedback both in person and via email after the show," he says. Showing film and video in a coffee shop may be unconventional but Davies views it as an opportunity. "Sometimes people can absorb new and unusual works better if they are not forced to sit in a theatre and focus solely on the film. At NoBrow, they can get Coffee or a snack or move to another corner and talk quietly if they need a break and then come back to absorb the rest of the program."
Davies, a Salt Lake native who studied Theatre at the University of Utah, has spent the past two-and-a-half years in San Fransisco, where he did freelance film and video work and created several films of his own. While there, he founded Loaf-I Productions, an organization of musicians and filmmakers living in various cities and towns across the U.S. "By developing and popularizing a low-fi aesthetic," their mission reads, "Loaf-I hopes to cut through the compost of corporate media to help artists and audiences cultivate provocative and inspiring styles of expression." Loaf-I produces the Free Form Film Festival, a traveling festival of live music, multimedia performance, installation, and quality film of all genres, which is one of the main curating forces behind OUT/EX.
OUT/EX will screen two types of film. The first, "experimental film," Davies describes as "basically the kind you would see in an art gallery. " He references Avant-Garde filmmakers like Stan Brakhage, and Bruce Conner, both of whom though considered "filmmakers" employ many techniqes and modes familiar to those interested in "video art." OUT/EX hopes to carry on this tradition of experimentalism with their screenings.
OUT/EX's second category of interest is what they call "Outsider" film and video. "This is stuff that is normally unusual by accident," says Davies. "Some of it is made by people who are untrained, some of it is really terrible and some of it is really terrific. Some Outsider work is actually made by professionals who got off track somewhere." Many of the "Outsider" films are provided byThe Lost Media Archive, a Utah-based collection of mondo/ kitch/ cult/ ephemeral/ experimental/ historical/ obsolete/ forgotten/ unearthed audio-visual and textual documents, founded by Blair Sterrett.
March's OUT/EX screening of outsider clips will feature ephemera from religious television programs (a preview can be seen in the video above, which contains religiously sensitive material). Davies realizes that many of the clips will provide fodder for a good laugh, but he thinks they will also be "sociologically insightful."
Though OUT/EX may screen a couple of feature-length films during the year, they will concentrate mostly on collections of shorts, which will allow people to "take breaks if they are not used to the more challenging fare," Davies says. "[Nobrow Coffee] is a nice environment just to hang out in, so I feel it's a good way to get some otherwise unlikely crowds hooked on the fare."
So, whether you're hooked on caffeine or celluloid, NoBrow Coffee (315 East 300 South) may be the place for you every third Saturday of the month. Screenings begin at 7:30 pm and are free (donations are greatly appreciated).
Salt Lake Tribune article on the Lost Media Archive (a FFFF collaboration)
Mining gems from the media trash heap Utahns find quirky magic in obsolete devices
By Anne Wilson
The Salt Lake Tribune
You probably missed "Got to Investigate Silicone," the snappy little musical produced and recorded on vinyl by General Electric for one of its annual conventions. And here's betting that "Music to Relax By in Your Barcalounger" is not in your personal collection. But that sort of vintage "product media," created for consumers, makes Blair Sterrett and Tyrone Davies go weak in the knees. They already have a storage unit in Ogden, Sterrett's hometown, stuffed with music, film, books, equipment and other scraps of media detritus that our throwaway society has deemed inconsequential. On Saturday at the NoBrow coffee shop in Salt Lake City, the duo will stage an exhibit they call "Excavations," when they will screen "delightfully bizarre" films and demonstrate some of their obsolete media formats, such as a wax cylinder player designed by Thomas Edison.
To Sterrett, founder of the Lost Media Archive, and Davies, his collaborator, such stuff is the sociological equivalent of gold, a fascinating blend of history and anthropology.
"It's like solving a mystery sometimes," said Davies, 29, a Salt Lake City filmmaker and freelance editor who met Sterrett, 30, when they were Mormon missionaries in Taiwan. Sterrett, a comic book artist, is temporarily living in Vermont while he attends the Center for Cartoon Studies. But he and Davies dream of someday birthing the contents of their storage unit into a media museum where people could view the development of media devices and products over time.
Davies also runs the Free Form Film Festival, which screens outsider and experimental films. In collaboration with Trasa Urban Arts, Davies is launching yet another project, screening selections from the festival month at NoBrow in a monthly event called Out/Ex. The first screening is Feb. 17 at 7 p.m.
Sterrett is more enamored of print and audio, especially outsider music, created by people who aren't classically trained but whose work is notable for its personality and emotion, whether it's brilliant or awful. He is an occasional contributor to the "365 Days Project" on radio station WFMU's "Beware of the Blog," which offers a daily clip of outsider music. One that Sterrett posted Tuesday is of a Latino boy named Antonio Eugenio Martinez singing "Puño de Tierra."
"This was found at an old antique shop near the railroad tracks in downtown Ogden, Utah. I don't speak any Spanish and know absolutely nothing about Antonio Eugenio Martinez. All I understood was that little face on the record's label," Sterrett wrote on the site. "The music turned out to be exactly what I hoped it would be and I fell in love with it instantly. I even played it while DJing at my friend Tyrone Davies' wedding reception."
Outsider music is "definitely worth listening to" because it's original and creative, unlike so much popular music, Sterrett said. "It's extremely personal. It's not watered down by 20 people in a studio."
Sterrett also collects tapes from telephone answering machines, another obsolete media format, because they provide tantalizing clues about people and their time.
"They're little snapshots into people's lives. . . . It just seems more of a time capsule of human existence," he said.
New life for old stuff * SAMPLES OF "forgotten media" from the Lost Media Archive, including film, audio and equipment, will be exhibited Saturday at 7 p.m. at NoBrow Coffee and Tea (inside Kayo Gallery), 315 E. 300 South, Salt Lake City. The event is free.
Free Form's function
The Free Form Film Festival is a travelling cinema, play, rock show and art
exhibit. Sue Carter Flinn checks in with its Halifax stop.
by Sue Carter Flinn
"Hold on, let me give a quick hurray - we just found out we're not lost," says Ryan Wylie, turning away from his cell phone to cheer on his fellow passengers. Navigation woes are inevitable as the co-founder of the Free Form Film Festival travels across North America in a convoy of three vehicles-two vans and a truck-stuffed with technical gear and a dozen musicians, lighting and video artists. You can hear the buzz of talk and traffic as the group drives through a Maine tollbooth on their way to Dingwall, Cape Breton, for the next stop on their tour.
The Free Form Film Festival, the brainchild of Wylie, Tyrone Davies and Mitchell Hill, is embarking on an ambitious 35-city trek across North America. Starting in Los Angeles, the live music, multimedia and short film tour will wind through towns big and small, rivalling major concert tours for clocked kilometres, before arriving at Halifax's Maritime Conservatory for Performing Arts on Friday.
Although film festivals have become synonymous with red carpet shenanigans and million-dollar contracts, Free Form deals in free expression.
"There are a lot of elements in the creation of media that just aren't seen in your standard movie theatre or on TV," says Davies. "We're there to be an outlet for the types of things that don't get shown. To us, a film festival should be an open exchange of ideas, and some you can't express in a typical movie structure. Some things are more abstract, some people have different world views that don't fit into a typical movie narrative, or even a typical documentary."
Artists submit their films to the Free Form founders, who in return promote, book and curate different shows for each area code they visit. Although the individual programs may vary, the format stays the same: a 70-minute screening of short films, followed by a live video and music performance.
"We curate our shows especially for the audience to make sure that the same film doesn't play that's played there before," Wylie explains. "Our mix is eclectic enough that we know that people are going to like a few things that we're playing, so we're not afraid to take chances. Some films might challenge people a bit more, but we still hope that they get something out of them."
Davies describes his own short film Aluminum, originally created as a music video for Chicago rock band Mahjong, as "cola wars meeting global warfare." Found footage of warfare and consumer goods mix to create a satirical rapid-eye product placement. Don't blink too long or you'll miss Pepsi and Coke rocket launchers. Another short film that has been making the Free Form circuit, the animated Grimm's Tales II: Death of the Hen by Brian Dewan, was picked up for an online version of McSweeney's, the American bastion of literary coolness.
The centrepiece of the festival is the The Human Story. After the last short film and music interlude, all of the musicians, video and lighting artists join together for an hour-long performance. Live electronica and acoustic music, provided by drums, piano, synthesizers and other instruments, swells and builds, while videos are mixed and projected onto large inflatable globes, in an attempt to explore our collective human experiences. Not exactly a two-minute pitch: Wylie admits that it can be difficult to explain this abstract concept.
"We don't really make much separation between different art forms," he explains. "In some ways it's been hard to know who to promote it to. We say we should get a film critic out, and a theatre critic, and a music critic, and an art critic, because even the inflatables themselves are interesting installations."
Although the Free Form Film Festival is ambitious in both miles travelled and in concept, their philosophy is rooted in the right place, especially for those who are sick of the summer's commercial film schlock.
"We're definitely not anti-narrative. If it's a good film, it's a good film," says Davies. "But so many things that are produced are derivative of 100 things that came before them. They're just not really refreshing. We want to be entertaining, but we want to provide fresh forms of media and communication."
La Prensa San Diego
September 3, 2004
The Free Form Film Festival at Media Arts Center San Diego
By Luis Alonso Pérez
Freedom to express, to create, to take pride in our culture, to experiment, to raise awareness, to laugh and to let the imagination run free.
Freedom is the common feature among the eclectic lineup of documentaries, video clips, and short films screened last Sunday at the Free Form Film Festival (FFFF) which took place at the Media Arts Center of San Diego (MACSD).
Around 7 pm the lights went off and the projector turned on. The atmosphere felt as relaxed as being at a friend's living room, and for next ninety minutes the audience saw the work of independent filmmakers from the United States, Canada and Argentina that usually don't have media access to show their material.
These are the type of events taking place in the "microcinema" at the Media Arts Center, the organization that puts together the annual San Diego Latino Film Festival, an eleven day event that shows more that a hundred movies and brings in around 15,000 attendants.
Unlike this big event, the FFFF is a small touring festival. Like its name indicates it's free, traveling through small and large cities al over the country presenting a wide selection of videos and sometimes live music shows. Their mission is to exhibit the work of independent filmmakers and provide artistic and cultural inspiration to the communities in which the festival takes place.
For Ryan Wylie, filmmaker and co-founder of the FFFF, what sets apart this festival from others, is their interest to promote the work from independent producers that choose not to follow the conventional filmmaking structures, and instead let the form and the aesthetics make the content flow.
For their San Diego tour stop the organizers prepared a very diverse lineup. Ninety minutes of short films, documentaries, video clips and experimental video.
"Meander" is the name of the festival organizer's favorite documentary. It's an audiovisual tour about life in east Austin, Texas. "Meander is one of the short films that's been in our lineup since we started" said Wylie "It looks like it was recorded with a 300 dollar camcorder, but it's a very simple yet beautiful video."
This three minute video directed by Tony de Aztlan and Dianne Zillioux portrays the human side of the residents from a very diverse community, taking us into a sad and melancholic atmosphere, where people appear and suddenly fade out, but they get to share their ideas with us and let us take a peak into their personal lives.
The war on Iraq was a common subject in the festival. Three short films exhibited their disapproval and criticism on President Bush's actions and the military intervention in the Middle East.
"November is very close and if were not talking about this now, then what are we doing?" said Wylie, who considers himself a social activist, and reflects his posture trough his short films and documentaries.
One of the future plans for this festival is to tour through the main cities of South America, screening their material and incorporating new material from local film and video makers to their lineup.
Hosting the Free Form Film Festival is one of the efforts made by the Media Arts Center of San Diego to promote independent film and give cultural alternatives to the San Diego community...
...For additional information regarding Media Arts Center San Diego visit their web page www.mediaartscenter.org. For more information about the Free Form Film Festival and their next tour stop go to www.Freeformfilmfestival.org
St. Louis Post Dispatch 9/30/05
It's not every Friday that an experimental video festival rolls into St. Louis and screens its offerings on a pair of giant, inflatable globes. But that's exactly what's on tap this weekend, as the Free Form Film Festival comes to Soulard's Mad Art Gallery with its current tour, "The Human Story." According to organizers, the event will feature live music and other performances. Or, as they more grandly put it: "With dual projections and spastic rhythms, video artists and musicians attempt to separate the direct experience of life, through the senses, from the directed experience of life, through logic and expectation." Ah! Filmmakers from all over the world - including Ryan B. Wylie of St. Louis - will be represented in the 70-minute-plus program. Clips from the FFFF Web site (www.freeformfilm.org) demonstrate that an eclectic group of challenging shorts have been offered on past tours, and there's no reason to think that the works of this three-month outing will be any less intriguing. (TC)
by Thomas Crown
