Project 2x1 is a 2013 American documentary film about the Hasidic and West Indian residents of Crown Heights, Brooklyn. It is shot in part using Google Glass. [1] Project 2x1 is directed by Hannah Roodman, [2] and produced by Lisa Campbell and Jaqueline Ratner Stauber. [3] The film is produced by a diverse group of Crown Heights residents; the Project 2×1 film project was initially founded by Mendy Seldowitz, Hannah Roodman, Celso White and Ben Millstein. [4] [5]
The use of Google Glass in the production of Project 2x1 allowed the film to harness the medium's storytelling capacities. The two distinctive cultural communities inhabiting the Crown Heights neighborhood (Hasidic and West Indian) and are each represented by the perspectives of community members. Both differences and similarities between the two communities are presented to the viewer, who is tasked with assuming multiple perspectives regarding culture, communal issues, and civic engagement. [6]
Project 2x1 is styled as a documentary film covering the daily lives of the Chabad Hasidic and West Indian residents of Crown Heights, Brooklyn. Both cultural as well as religious events are captured in the film. Footage is shot, in part, using Google Glass. The film project is named "2x1" after the two mile by one mile radius of the Crown Heights neighbourhood. [3] [4] [7] [8]
The film focuses primarily on the iconic Hasidic and Caribbean residents, to the exclusion of other demographic groups living in the area. [9]
Aside from the film "documenting [a] day within the neighborhood", the film examines "the way interpersonal relationships form between members of divergent communities all living within blocks of each other." [10] The makers of the film have stated that their aim and stated goal is to promote tolerance and understanding between the Caribbean and Hasidic residents, by releasing a documentary of the day-to-day lives of Crown Heights locals from their respective communities. [11] [12] [13]
The film is shot in part using Google Glass, a pair of glasses frames with video capturing film in a kind of "first-person point of view". [4] The film is cut from scenes shot by residents themselves. The scenes are collected by filmmakers who "[walk] around the neighborhood of Crown Heights, giving Google Glass to people to record what they see."
The Google Glass concept for use in the film was conceived by project co-founder Mendy Seldowitz who was chosen as a "Google Glass Explorer". [8] [12] [14] [15] Google Glass is not available to the general public, instead, there are 10,000 "Google Glass Explorers" who received the device for initial use. [16] Prior to the film project, Seldowitz had experimented filming local scenes in Crown Heights using his pair of Google Glass. [17] Seldowitz cited the advantage of using Glass as it "removes the influence of the filmmaker". [18]
The Crown Heights documentary claims to be the first ever to be shot with Google Glass. [7] [19] However, the documentary is not filmed exclusively on Google Glass; some scenes were filmed with DSLR videography in an interview format. [20] [21]
The battery life on Google Glass was a "major issue" for the filmmakers, forcing them to shoot for short periods before recharging Glass. [15]
The film was initially screened in Crown Heights, on December 8, 2013. [10] [22] [23] The Brooklyn Historical Society and Brooklyn Film & Arts Festival partnered in a later screening the film, on December 13, 2013. [19] [24]
Brooklyn is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, located on the westernmost edge of Long Island in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most-densely-populated county in the United States, behind New York County (Manhattan). Brooklyn is also New York City's most populous borough, with 2,736,074 residents in 2020. If Brooklyn were an independent city, it would be the third most populous in the U.S. after the rest of New York City and Los Angeles, and ahead of Chicago.
Chabad, also known as Lubavitch, Habad and Chabad-Lubavitch, is an Orthodox Jewish Hasidic dynasty. Chabad is one of the world's best-known Hasidic movements, particularly for its outreach activities. It is one of the largest Hasidic groups and Jewish religious organizations in the world. Unlike most Haredi groups, which are self-segregating, Chabad operates mainly in the wider world and caters to secularized Jews.
Borough Park is a neighborhood in the southwestern part of the borough of Brooklyn, in New York City. The neighborhood is bordered by Bensonhurst to the south, Dyker Heights to the southwest, Sunset Park to the west, Kensington and Green-Wood Cemetery to the northeast, Flatbush to the east, and Mapleton to the southeast.
Crown Heights is a neighborhood in the central portion of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. Crown Heights is bounded by Washington Avenue to the west, Atlantic Avenue to the north, Ralph Avenue to the east, and Empire Boulevard/East New York Avenue to the south. It is about one mile (1.6 km) wide and two miles (3.2 km) long. Neighborhoods bordering Crown Heights include Prospect Heights to the west, Flatbush and Prospect Lefferts Gardens to the south, Brownsville to the east, and Bedford–Stuyvesant to the north.
Bensonhurst is a residential neighborhood in the southwestern section of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The neighborhood is bordered on the northwest by 14th Avenue, on the northeast by 60th Street, on the southeast by Avenue P and 22nd Avenue and on the southwest by 86th Street. It is adjacent to the neighborhoods of Dyker Heights to the northwest, Borough Park and Mapleton to the northeast, Bath Beach to the southwest, and Gravesend to the southeast.
Williamsburg is a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, bordered by Greenpoint to the north; Bedford–Stuyvesant to the south; Bushwick and East Williamsburg to the east; and the East River to the west. It was an independent city until 1855, when it was annexed by Brooklyn; at that time, the spelling was changed from Williamsburgh to Williamsburg.
Prospect Heights is a neighborhood in the northwest of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The traditional boundaries are Flatbush Avenue to the west, Atlantic Avenue to the north, Eastern Parkway – beginning at Grand Army Plaza – to the south, and Washington Avenue to the east. In the northern section of Prospect Heights are the Vanderbilt Rail Yards, built over as part of the Pacific Park project. The Barclays Center, home to the NBA's Brooklyn Nets basketball team, is located in the northwestern corner of the neighborhood in Pacific Park at Flatbush and Atlantic Avenues.
The Crown Heights riot was a race riot that took place from August 19 to August 21, 1991, in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn, New York City. Black residents attacked Orthodox Jewish residents, damaged their homes, and looted businesses. The riots began on August 19, 1991, after two children of Guyanese immigrants were accidentally struck by a car running a red light while following the motorcade of Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the leader of Chabad, a Jewish religious movement. One child died and the second was severely injured.
Bedford–Stuyvesant, colloquially known as Bed–Stuy, is a neighborhood in the northern section of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. Bedford–Stuyvesant is bordered by Flushing Avenue to the north, Classon Avenue to the west, Broadway to the east, and Atlantic Avenue to the south. The main shopping street, Fulton Street runs east–west the length of the neighborhood and intersects high-traffic north–south streets including Bedford Avenue, Nostrand Avenue, and Stuyvesant Avenue. Bedford–Stuyvesant contains four smaller neighborhoods: Bedford, Stuyvesant Heights, Ocean Hill, and Weeksville. Part of Clinton Hill was once considered part of Bedford–Stuyvesant.
Fires in the Mirror: Crown Heights, Brooklyn and Other Identities (1992) is a one-person play by Anna Deavere Smith, an African-American playwright, author, actress, and professor. It explores the Crown Heights riot and its aftermath through the viewpoints of African-American and Jewish people, mostly based in New York City, who were connected directly and indirectly to the riot.
Shomrim or Shmira are organizations of proactive volunteer Jewish civilian patrols which have been set up in Haredi communities in neighborhoods across the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom to combat burglary, vandalism, mugging, assault, domestic violence, nuisance crimes and antisemitic attacks, and to help and support victims of crime. They also help locate missing people.
Mendy Pellin is an American Chabad Hasidic comic with a web-based satirical news show called The Mendy Report.
Elke Reva Sudin is a Jewish-American painter, illustrator and lecturer. In 2010, her Hipsters and Hassids painting series premiered in New York City, comparing and contrasting her Hasidic Jewish origins and hipster Brooklyn cultures. She founded NY Drawing Booth in 2014, and is also a founder of Jewish Art Now.
Rachel Grady is an American documentary filmmaker.
Bulletproof Stockings was an American Hasidic alternative rock band based in Crown Heights, New York City. Formed in 2011 by lead singer Perl Wolfe and ex-Hopewell drummer Dalia Shusterman, the group independently released its debut EP, Down to the Top the following year. They were noted for their unique sound among Jewish music, as well as their adherence to the prohibition of kol isha by performing for female-only audiences.
Chabad hipsters are the cross-acculturated members of the Chabad Hasidic community and contemporary hipster subculture. Beginning from the late 2000s through the 2010s, a minor trend of cross acculturation of Chabad Hasidism and hipster subculture appeared within the New York Jewish community. The first printed reference to this trend was the 2007 New York Press cover story, "Hipster Hassids" by Alyssa Pinsker. Later, according to The Jewish Daily Forward, a significant number of members of the Chabad Hasidic community, mostly residing in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, appear to now have adopted various cultural affinities of the local hipster subculture.
Rogers Park is an American Hasidic folk rock duo from Chicago, Illinois. Formed in 2011 by childhood friends Yosef Peysin and Mordy Kurtz, the group is named after the Chicago neighborhood where they grew up. Their debut album, The Maggid, was released on January 19, 2016.
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