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James Fotopoulos (born 1976, Norridge, Illinois) is an independent filmmaker whose work is low-budget and rigorous, and consists of experimental narrative features, non-narrative shorts, and video installations. [1] He began creating his film projects as a teenager in 1993, and as of 2012, has made over 100 films and videos. [2] [3]
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Fotopoulos' work was featured in the 2004 Whitney Biennial [4] and he has collaborated with media artist Cory Arcangel.
The Film Journal praises Fotopoulos, writing he is "one of cinema's most unique voices, a filmmaker of uncompromising vision." [2]
Of Fotopoulos' film Migrating Forms , Amy Taubin of The Village Voice wrote that while it was not a pleasurable experience, the film stayed with her most vividly as a "kind of stripped-down Eraserhead", which offered "a formal purity and obsessive power that's all too rare these days". [5]
James Fotopoulos was raised in Norridge, Illinois. His father was a policeman and his mother a hairdresser. He displayed artistic aptitude as a child and devoted his attention to filmmaking at age 15. His 1997 film Zero, shot when he was 18 years old during his first year as a film student at Columbia College Chicago, was his first feature. [7] In 1998 James founded his production company Fantasma Inc. [8]
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Norridge is a village in Cook County, Illinois, United States. The population was 15,251 at the 2020 census. The village and its neighbor to the east, Harwood Heights, together form an enclave within the city of Chicago. Norridge is sometimes referred to as the "Island Within a City". The current President of Norridge is Daniel Tannhauser.
Jonas Mekas was a Lithuanian-American filmmaker, poet, and artist who has been called "the godfather of American avant-garde cinema". Mekas's work has been exhibited in museums and at festivals worldwide. Mekas was active in New York City, where he co-founded Anthology Film Archives, The Film-Makers' Cooperative, and the journal Film Culture. He was also the first film critic for The Village Voice.
James Benning is an American independent filmmaker and educator. Over the course of his 40-year career Benning has made over twenty-five feature-length films that have shown in many different venues across the world. Since 1987, he has taught at California Institute of the Arts (CalArts). He is known as a minimalist filmmaker.
An underground film is a film that is out of the mainstream either in its style, genre or financing.
Experimental film or avant-garde cinema is a mode of filmmaking that rigorously re-evaluates cinematic conventions and explores non-narrative forms or alternatives to traditional narratives or methods of working. Many experimental films, particularly early ones, relate to arts in other disciplines: painting, dance, literature and poetry, or arise from research and development of new technical resources.
The New York Underground Film Festival was an annual event that occurred each March at Anthology Film Archives in New York City from 1994 through 2008. It was founded by filmmakers Todd Phillips and Andrew Gurland. After Phillips and Gurland turned the festival over to programmer Ed Halter, it became noted for documentary and experimental film programming, and occasionally courted controversy, particularly in its early years.
Jon Moritsugu is an American cult-underground filmmaker and musician. His movies are satiric, protopunk deconstructions of popular genres and formats with scabrous and pointedly garish results. The New York Times describes them as "funny, anarchic, provocative and exhilarating". Influenced by the nihilism of Jean-Luc Godard and Guy Debord, Moritsugu's films are often defined by their "lo-fi" aesthetic and were initially shot on 16mm film for a gritty, visceral quality. He states that he often "pay(s) less attention to narrative flow and storyline and put(s) more emphasis on sight, sound and spectacle" to create a movie that is "like a live punk/hardcore show." The works themselves are often absurdist comedies that feature actress, co-writer, stylist, and wife, Amy Davis. Perhaps best known for his cult film Mod Fuck Explosion, Moritsugu's films have been screened at Sundance, Cannes, Berlin, Toronto, Rotterdam, Venice, USA Film Festival, New York Underground, Chicago Underground, MoMA, Guggenheim, Whitney and numerous other festivals and museums. In 2001 he received the Moving Image award from Creative Capital.
Wavelength is a 1967 experimental film by Canadian artist Michael Snow. Shot from a fixed camera angle, it depicts a loft space with an extended zoom over the duration of the film. Considered a landmark of avant-garde cinema, it was filmed over one week in December 1966 and edited in 1967, and is an example of what film theorist P. Adams Sitney describes as "structural film", calling Snow "the dean of structural filmmakers."
Sarah Jacobson was an American film director, screenwriter, and producer.
Film Comment is the official publication of Film at Lincoln Center. It features reviews and analysis of mainstream, art-house, and avant-garde filmmaking from around the world. Founded in 1962 and originally released as a quarterly, Film Comment began publishing on a bi-monthly basis with the Nov/Dec issue of 1972. The magazine's editorial team also hosts the annual Film Comment Selects at the Film at Lincoln Center. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, publication of the magazine was suspended in May 2020, and its website was updated on March 10, 2021, with news of the relaunch of the Film Comment podcast and a weekly newsletter.
Amy Taubin is an American author and film critic. She is a contributing editor for two prominent film magazines, the British Sight & Sound and the American Film Comment. She has also written regularly for the SoHo Weekly News, The Village Voice, The Millennium Film Journal, and Artforum, and used to be curator of video and film at the non-profit experimental performance space The Kitchen.
Peggy Ahwesh is an American experimental filmmaker and video artist. She received her B.F.A. at Antioch College. A bricoleur who has created both narrative works and documentaries, some projects are scripted and others incorporate improvised performance. She makes use of sync sound, found footage, digital animation, and Pixelvision video. Her work is primarily an investigation of cultural identity and the role of the subject in various genres. Her interests include genre; women, sexuality and feminism; reenactment; and artists' books. Her works have been shown worldwide, including in San Francisco, New York, Barcelona, London, Toronto, Rotterdam, and Créteil, France. Starting in 1990, she has taught at Bard College as a Professor of Film and Electronic Arts. Her teaching interests include: experimental media, history of the non-fiction film, and women in film.
Christabel is a 2001 avant-garde experimental film directed by James Fotopoulos and based on the unfinished poem of the same name by Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
Luther Price (pseudonym) was an experimental filmmaker and visual artist.
The Millennium Film Workshop is a non-profit media arts center located in New York City. It is dedicated to the exhibition, study, and practice of avant-garde and experimental cinema. It was also where the St. Mark's Poetry Project began. Ken Jacobs stated in 2013 that he chose the name Millennium "...because it would have to be that to actually give out equipment, education, space to work in, etc. for free. Dictionary definition: 'A hoped for period of joy, serenity, prosperity and justice.' "
Ethnocinema, from Jean Rouch’s cine-ethnography and ethno-fictions, is an emerging practice of intercultural filmmaking being defined and extended by Melbourne, Australia-based writer and arts educator, Anne Harris, and others. Originally derived from the discipline of anthropology, ethnocinema is one form of ethnographic filmmaking that prioritises mutuality, collaboration and social change. The practice's ethos claims that the role of anthropologists, and other cultural, media and educational researchers, must adapt to changing communities, transnational identities and new notions of representation for the 21st century.
Grandpa's Ghost is an experimental American band from Pocahontas, Illinois. The group was founded by Ben Hanna and Bill Emerson in 1995 on the outskirts of St. Louis, Missouri, in Pocahontas & Pierron, Illinois and was initially associated with the second wave of alt-country music from the region that included Uncle Tupelo, The Bottle Rockets, Son Volt, and Wilco. The current lineup features Hanna, Emerson, and Jack Petracek.
Variety is a 1983 American drama film directed by Bette Gordon with a screenplay by Kathy Acker from a story by Gordon. The film stars Sandy McLeod, Will Patton, and Richard M. Davidson. The film follows a young woman who takes a job at a New York City pornographic theater and becomes increasingly obsessed with a wealthy patron who may or may not be involved with the mafia.
Bradley Eros is an experimental film director, actor, curator, poet, and performance artist who also makes Musique concrète sound collages, music videos, photographs, live projection performances, works on paper and art objects.
Side/Walk/Shuttle is a 1991 American avant-garde film directed by Ernie Gehr. It shows downtown San Francisco as seen at different angles from a moving elevator.
