Hailing itself as Slamdance Film Festival's "largest and most accessible festival yet," Slamdance 2021 runs virtually from February 12th through 15th, and can be accessed with an impressively cheap $10 festival pass. With its long-time focus on emerging artists, the 27th edition of the festival boasts 25 features plus 107...
In the Criminal Justice Club at Horizon High School in El Paso, Texas, students bond and gain camaraderie while also rigorously training for careers in law enforcement. Horizon's program is the subject of At the Ready, filmmaker Maisie Crow's enthralling yet challenging documentary that premiered at Sundance Film Festival in...
In February 2020, artists Anida Yoeu Ali and Shin Yu Pai, served on the Arts Innovator Award (AIA) juror panel for the Seattle-based grantmaking organization, Artist Trust (AT). The AIA is the largest unrestricted award presently available for Washington State artists, funded by the Chihuly family and administered by AT....
In the directorial debut of their feature film, Borrufa, Portland-based artist, performer, and filmmaker Roland Dahwen presents a quiet portrait of the trials and tribulations faced by immigrant families in the United States. Poetically and ambiguously named, Borrufa is shot on Super 16mm film stock and unconventional by most mainstream filmmaking...
When Moroni Benally signs the paperwork to run for Navajo Nation president, he giggles. Moroni For President, a charming documentary profile of his 2014 campaign, captures the high stakes of the race to become the leader of the Navajo Nation, the largest Native American territory by landmass and population. Moroni,...
Despite Kadazia Allen-Perry's youth, her cystic fibrosis has forced her to confront her own mortality. In her autobiographical documentary, Chronic Means Forever, the African-American first-time filmmaker provides an intimate exploration into the feelings of alienation and frustration which accompany her life-long diagnosis. Allen-Perry is faced daily with the perpetual struggle to...
Photography by Claire FinucaneWe are said to dream on any given night, even if we fail to remember its contents. For the inaugural performances of Arya Davachi's immersive theatre piece, Rough Sleeper, a woman polls us before we enter the venue. Did we sleep well last night? Did we dream?...
It’s tempting to think of SXSW Eco as the weird hippie brother of the massive music-film-interactive-free-vodka-was-that-Bill-Murray-and-RZA? festival. In reality, SXSW Eco is South By Southwest’s chic sister, just back from Les Ateliers and looking for ways to change the world while classing the joint up a bit. The conference, now...
"I suppose with the video for 'World War Pt. 2', we were going for cheap thrills on one level, but maintaining cognizance of what a funny looking little dude could communicate under these conditions in a human and emotionally salient way. Maybe I’m trying to be honest about what I...
Jax Deluca and Kyle Marler of Flatsitter discovered one another years ago on an Amtrak train, in what one might call an act of divine timing, or a perfect illustration of the "right place, right time" adage. What emerged from this meeting is a male-female powerhouse duo, who use an...
Platform, the second full-length from San Francisco musician, producer, and conceptual artist Holly Herndon, tackles the many confusing, conflicted layers of modern living, in the form of a poppy, accessible dancefloor sound sculpture. ...
