The Chicago Film Archives
will host
a cross-cultural evening
of film and music
at Millennium Park
on July 17
(Chicago — 21 May 2018) The US premiere of Chicago Film Archives new International Media Mixer project will take place on July 17, 2018 as part of the Millennium Park Summer Film Series produced by the Chicago Department of Special Events and Cultural Affairs (DCASE).
Nearly two years in the making, the Mixer is the CFA’s largest and most ambitious to date, involving nine artists working in Italy and the US.
Funded by the MacArthur Foundation’s “International Connections” fund, the International Media Mixer is a cross-cultural artistic exchange in which Italian artists were commissioned to make a new film using material from CFA’s collections and Chicago-based artists using footage from a regional Italian archive, Lab 80 film – Cinescatti.
CFA INTERNATIONAL MEDIA MIXER
Video by Cerise Films / Original Track “Birdseed” by Salvatore Córdova
Each visual artist was paired with an audio artist from the other country, resulting in completely new collaborations and interpretations of historical material.
The filmmakers were asked to explore, interpret, and use material from another culture, another country, and another era as they liked. The US-based filmmakers were then paired with Italian musicians while the Italian-based filmmakers were paired with Chicago-based musicians to create soundtracks for the new video pieces.
This resulted in a truly collaborative project that brought together artists in Italy and Chicago as well as our two regional film archives based in Chicago and Bergamo.
In a press release, the CFA stated, “We think that there are great stories to be told about this international collaboration and the relationships that have developed between the artists and curators.”
Musicians Patrizia Oliva, Stefano Urkuma De Santis and Italian curator Karianne Fiorini are traveling to Chicago for the US premiere at Millennium Park. Four new pieces will be premiered with live performances by the Italian and Chicago musicians. Alison Cuddy will host the event.
Artist pairs are:
Giuseppe Boccassini (IT) + Alex Inglizian (US)
Lori Felker (US) + Patrizia Oliva (IT)
Federico Francioni & Yan Cheng (IT) + Tomeka Reid (US)
Domietta Torlasco (US) + Stefano Urkuma De Santis (IT)
Learn read more about the project here. Get to know the artists here.
About Chicago Film Archives
Chicago Film Archives is a non-profit 501(c)(3) institution established in late 2003 in order to preserve and catalogue over five thousand 16mm films donated by the Chicago Public Library. Director, Nancy Watrous and a few devoted film archivists conceived a plan to create a regional film archive that conserves, promotes and exhibits moving image materials that reflect Chicago and Midwest history and culture.
As part of the ongoing expansion of its holdings, CFA has begun collecting amateur and home movies from people in Chicago and other regions of Illinois. To underscore this initiative, each year CFA sponsors the Chicago branch of the annual Home Movie Day, an international program that encourages the preservation and exhibition of home movies. In addition, CFA continues to acquire professional films that reflect our region’s history and culture as well as films that are artistic expressions of our local filmmakers.
Send your film news to Reel Chicago Editor Dan Patton, dan@reelchicago.com.
