Screening and Discussion: Youth Creativity in 16mm

Thursday, August 1 | 6:30–8:00pm

Co-programmed by Gabo Camnitzer and Jessica Gordon-Burroughs

Co-sponsored by the Film-Makers' Cooperative

In-person discussion following the screening between Gabo Camnitzer and former youth filmmaker Andrew Gurian

In this program, we will explore the pioneering audiovisual teaching experiments of New York City’s Young Filmakers Foundation and how it enabled radical artistic practice. We will screen Chilean filmmaker and film teacher Jaime Barrios’ Film Club (1968, 16mm to digital), and student films including Michael Jacobsohn’s The Young Braves (1968, 16mm to digital), Linda Rivera’s Young Love (1970, 16mm to digital), Andrew Gurian’s That Rotten Teabag (1964, 16mm to digital) and Anthony Joseph’s Superbug (1972, 16mm to digital).

Screening lineup:

Jaime Barrios’ Film Club (1968, 16mm to digital)

Michael Jacobsohn’s The Young Braves (1968, 16mm to digital)

Linda Rivera’s Young Love (1970, 16mm to digital)

Andrew Gurian’s That Rotten Teabag (1964, 16mm to digital)

Anthony Joseph’s Superbug (1972, 16mm to digital)

Interview with Tony Joseph by Jessica Gordon-Burroughs, Video by Michael Jacobsohn

The event will be streamed live on Wave Farm Radio and broadcast at a later date on Montez Press Radio as a part of a series of broadcasts called Airhead – Faculty Meetings at P·P·O·W

Filmmakers

Chilean filmmaker Jaime Barrios arrived in New York City in 1963 to attend the School of Visual Arts and was soon active in an experimental scene, which overlapped with the New York Underground and tightly intertwined with his media activism at the Young Filmaker’s Foundation (YFF). The YFF, founded by art educator Rodger Larson alongside Barrios and New York philanthropist Lynne Hofer, was a community outreach project for New York City youths dedicated to training them in the art of 16mm filmmaking. Later emulated throughout the United States as part of the nationwide War on Poverty, the New York City film workshops served as a blueprint of a brief, yet effervescent, movement.

Andrew Gurian has been making films since the age of 12. He began working in [JG1] video in 1972 with Shirley Clarke’s TP Videospace Troupe, is a periodic guest lecturer at NYU’s Gallatin School of Individualized Study, and has published in the Millennium Film Journal. His films, video installations, and video performances have been presented on WNET/Channel 13, at the Museum of Modern Art, The Metropolitan Museum, University Settlement, and The Construction Company, among other venues. Since 2007 Andrew’s projections have been a continual part of Subway Moon and Brooklyn Porch Music, on-going musical/video performing experiences that combine the forces of professional jazz musicians and filmmakers with high-school music students from around the world. This program is documented in his “World of Fire” video, available at https://vimeo.com/477629916.

Michael Jacobsohn began making award-winning movies as a teenager at the Henry Street Settlement Movie Club. His work has been shown internationally and is now in the permanent collection at NYPL Lincoln Center. He was a staff editor at ABC News &Sports for 28 years and his awards include an Emmy. He has since produced and directed three full-length documentaries and several shorts and is currently at work on a documentary about the fabled Cornelia Street Café.

Anthony Joseph began making movies in high school with his father's Super-8 camera. He grew up in New York City and studied filmmaking at NYU film school. In between jobs in the 9-5 world, he worked on feature films, TV commercials and music videos, and wrote scripts for film and stage. Currently he lives in the midwest, retired with his wife and three cats, working on a computer animated action comedy.

Linda Rivera preferred to not give a formal bio, and let her work speak for itself.

Co-programmers

Dr Jessica Gordon-Burroughs is Lecturer (US: Assistant Professor) in Latin American Studies and Visual Culture at the University of Edinburgh (UK). Her essays have appeared in Journal of Latin American Cultural Studies, Journal of Cinema and Media Studies, Discourse, among other journals and collections, including the article “Looking Back and Away: Jaime Barrios’s Film Club (1964)”, recently reprinted in extract form by the The Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona. She has recently presented on her research at Documenta fifteen, the Cuban National Film Institute (ICAIC), and Oxford University.

Gabo Camnitzer is an artist and educator working across experimental pedagogy, installation, and video. Camnitzer’s work revolves around questions of education and knowledge exchange, often focusing on childhood to examine the societal structures that surround and shape subjectivity. Camnitzer is Associate Professor of Art Education at MassArt. He has previously held teaching positions at UMass Dartmouth, Columbia University, Valand Academy, and the Neighborhood School (PS 363), a public elementary school in NYC. He has presented projects at venues such as Queens Museum, New York; Konsthall C, Stockholm; Momentum Biennale, Moss, Norway; Hacer Noche, Oaxaca; Kunstsaele, Berlin; GfZK, Leipzig; Artists Space, New York; Bonniers Konsthall, Stockholm; Gertrude Contemporary Art Center, Melbourne; Museo Blanes, Montevideo, Uruguay. He received his MFA from Valand Academy, Gothenburg, Sweden, and attended the Whitney Independent Study Program, New York. He sits on the editorial board of the Swedish Art Journal, Paletten.