Chuck Smith is a New York-based documentary filmmaker, television producer and author.
He created a 48-minute film Forrest Bess: Key to the Riddle in 1999 about the artist Forrest Bess. [1] It featured Willem Dafoe as the voice of Bess and was co-directed by Ari Marcopoulos.
His 2018 film Barbara Rubin & the Exploding NY Underground was a biographical documentary about the 1960s experimental filmmaker and scene-maker Barbara Rubin. [2] [3] The film won the 2018 Metropolis Competition at the DOC NYC film festival. [4]
Smith's publications include a Forrest Bess book that was published by powerHouse Books in 2013 with a Foreword by Robert Thurman, [5] and Film Culture 80: The Legend of Barbara Rubin (2019) co-edited with Jonas Mekas and published by Spector Books. [6]
Jonas Mekas was a Lithuanian-American filmmaker, poet, and artist who has been called "the godfather of American avant-garde cinema" on many occasions. His work has been exhibited in museums and at festivals worldwide.
Barbara Jean Hammer was an American feminist film director, producer, writer, and cinematographer. She is known for being one of the pioneers of the lesbian film genre, and her career spanned over 50 years. Hammer is known for having created experimental films dealing with women's issues such as gender roles, lesbian relationships, coping with aging, and family life. She resided in New York City and Kerhonkson, New York, and taught each summer at the European Graduate School.
No wave cinema was an underground filmmaking movement that flourished on the Lower East Side of New York City from about 1976 to 1985. Sponsored by the artists group Collaborative Projects, no wave cinema was a stripped-down style of guerrilla filmmaking that emphasized dark edgy mood and unrehearsed immediacy above many other artistic concerns – similar to the parallel no wave music movement in its raw and rapid style.
Forrest Clemenger Bess was an American painter and fisherman. He was discovered and promoted by the art dealer Betty Parsons. He is known for his abstract, symbol-laden paintings based on what he called "visions."
Filmmaker, or "Filmmaker: a diary by george lucas", is a 32-minute documentary made in 1968 by George Lucas about the making of Francis Ford Coppola's 1969 film The Rain People.
John Francis Carluccio is an American filmmaker, artist, and inventor. Carluccio is a two-time Emmy-nominated filmmaker who is best known for documenting obscure pockets of urban society and the creative process.
Lynne Sachs is an American experimental filmmaker and poet living in Brooklyn, New York. Her moving image work ranges from documentaries, to essay films, to experimental shorts, to hybrid live performances. Working from a feminist perspective, Sachs weaves together social criticism with personal subjectivity. Her films embrace a radical use of archives, performance and intricate sound work. Between 2013 and 2020, she collaborated with musician and sound artist Stephen Vitiello on five films.
Andrew Hollander is a film composer, songwriter, and producer. Born in West Orange, New Jersey, he gravitated toward music at the age of 13. After playing piano and drums in high school bands, Hollander was mentored by the late Yusef Lateef, who nabbed him to play piano on 3 of his albums with the likes of Kamal Sabir, Rene McLean Jr., and Avery Sharpe. He moved to New York City where he worked with filmmaker Adrienne Shelly and musicians, including singer David Johansen, a member of glam rock band the New York Dolls and drummer, Charley Drayton, who has collaborated with Bob Dylan and Fiona Apple.
Barbara Smith Conrad was an American opera singer. A mezzo-soprano, she performed with the Metropolitan Opera, Vienna State Opera, Teatro Nacional in Venezuela, and many others. She was also an educator, co-directing the Wagner Theater Program, which she co-founded, and maintaining a private studio as well as taking up multiple artist residencies.
Drivers Wanted is a 2012 documentary film about 55 Stan, a New York City taxi depot in Queens, NY. It was directed by Joshua Z Weinstein and produced by Jean Tsien. As well as directing, Weinstein participated in the film, often riding in the passenger seat of the taxi.
Barbara Rubin (1945–1980) was an American filmmaker and performance artist. She is best known for her landmark 1963 underground film Christmas on Earth.
Doc NYC is an annual documentary film festival in New York City. Co-founded by Thom Powers and Raphaela Neihausen, the festival is the country's largest documentary film festival with over 300 films and events and 250 special guests. By 2014, DOC NYC had become America's largest documentary film festival and voted by MovieMaker magazine as one of the “top five coolest documentary film festivals in the world”. The festival takes place over 9 days in November at the West Village's IFC Center, Chelsea's Cinépolis, and SVA Theater.
Piero Heliczer was an Italian-American poet, publisher, actor and filmmaker associated with the New American Cinema.
Josh Swade is an American documentary filmmaker and author, working primarily in the sports and music genres. His feature films include Ricky Powell: The Individualist, about street photographer Ricky Powell, which premiered on Showtime in 2021; One & Done, about basketball player Ben Simmons, which premiered on Showtime in 2016; and the 2012 ESPN 30 for 30 documentary There's No Place Like Home. He has directed and produced several ESPN 30 for 30 Shorts, and several short films on popular musicians, including The Black Keys, Rick Rubin, Sheryl Crow, Major Lazer, and Gary Clark Jr. He also wrote the book The Holy Grail of Hoops: One Fan's Quest to Buy the Original Rules of Basketball.
Terrell James is an American artist who makes abstract paintings, prints and sculptures. She is best known for large scale work with paint on stretched fabric, and for parallel small scale explorations such as the Field Studies series, ongoing since 1997. She lives and works in Houston, Texas.
Jessica Edwards is a Canadian-American filmmaker known for her documentary Mavis! about musician and civil rights figure Mavis Staples.
Alysa Nahmias is an American director, producer, and writer. She is the founder of Ajna Films. Nahmias directed and produced the feature documentary Unfinished Spaces, about the Cuban National Art Schools, with Benjamin Murray. Unfinished Spaces won an Independent Spirit Award in 2012 and is part of the Museum of Modern Art's permanent collection. Nahmias also directed and produced the 2019 documentary The New Bauhaus chronicling the art and design icon, László Moholy-Nagy. The film features Moholy-Nagy's daughter, Hattula, and contemporary art curator Hans Ulrich Obrist reads Moholy-Nagy's words on screen. Her producing credits include Unrest, by director Jennifer Brea, which won the Special Jury Award for Best Editing at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival. Her producing credits also include: No Light and No Land Anywhere, by director Amber Sealey with creative advisor Miranda July; Shield and Spear, by director Petter Ringbom; What We Left Unfinished, by director Mariam Ghani; and Afternoon of a Faun: Tanaquil Le Clercq by director Nancy Buirski with creative advisor Martin Scorsese. In 2020 Alysa executive produced Weed & Wine, directed by Rebecca Richman Cohen which premiered at Hot Docs, Deauville, and DOC NYC film festivals in 2020.
Sally Rubin is an American documentary film director, producer, editor, and professor. She is best known for her work on the documentary films Mama Has a Mustache, Hillbilly, Deep Down, Life on the Line, and The Last Mountain.
Jeremy Workman is an American filmmaker and editor. His documentary films frequently focus on eccentrics, outsiders, and those with extreme passions. His acclaimed films include Lily Topples The World, The World Before Your Feet, Magical Universe, and Who Is Henry Jaglom? In most of his films, Workman serves as the director, cinematographer, and editor.
Time is a 2020 American documentary film produced and directed by Garrett Bradley. It follows Sibil Fox Richardson, fighting for the release of her husband, Rob, who is serving a 60-year prison sentence for engaging in an armed bank robbery.