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Launching the Transparency Project
- Posted on 15th Feb
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At the Sundance Film Festival in January, we announced The Transparency Project – a new initiative to shine some light on the hidden data around what indie films are making in revenue from various sources. We can all find box office, but the numbers for what’s being made on VOD, at festivals, in community screenings – all of this is relatively hidden. This project, an initiative founded by Sundance and Cinreach now has multiple nonprofit partners and numerous for-profit partners. I’ve been working as a project consultant on this for over a year, so it was awesome to finally launch it and be able to speak about it publicly.

Want to learn more? I recommend you check out the Transparency website, read this great article from Filmmaker Magazine or this one from Thompson on Hollywood. We hope to launch a beta of our data analytics tool soon, so sign the pledge on the website and get early access to the beta test.

This is an iterative project – we’ll shape it based on feedback from the field. There’s a link on the site to send us feedback, but if you know me, send me your feedback directly, as all of us want to keep making this project better. I look forward to hearing your thoughts.
Ten Predictions for 2015
- Posted on 5th Jan
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It’s the year to year transition favorite pastime of nearly everyone, so here’s my list of predictions for 2015. You can look at last year’s list here, and while I didn’t get everything right, by my count I was correct on 6/10 so that’s not too bad. Up for 2015:

1. Branded Content will spread into Fiction Feature Films: Last year I predicted a flood of branded content, and I was right. I also participated in this myself, helping Patagonia with DamNation. But most of these efforts have been around short form narrative and documentary content. I think this year will see many more brand attempts at feature fiction films. It’s been done before, so this won’t be new, but I think we’ll see some new distribution models tried out as well.

2. More VC money for quality content: VC’s and investors generally have stayed far away from content. It scares them and they’ve been ripped off by it too many times. But in the past year, we’ve seen a lot more investor activity around content, and while most of this has been around what I’d loosely call “new journalism endeavors,” I think this year will see more activity around creative videos, documentary endeavors and even fiction narratives. There’s a lot of money out there looking for a home, and I bet some of it lands in content soon.

3. Facebook will launch original content: I’ve been saying this for years now, and some people seem to finally agree with me – Facebook is a network, and eventually all networks need content. While they did pull out of the Newsfronts, ending a lot of speculation, I think it was just about timing. My hope is that they’ve looked at all the competition out there, and how much of it is just more crap, that they decided they need to come out in a big way and do something different. I have some thoughts on what this might be, but that’s for another post. For now, my bet is a big push in late 2015.

4. Someone will launch an (attempted) Netflix killer: And it won’t be any of the existing players in the current video space. If you’re a film fan, Netflix pretty much sucks now. Tons of great films have been dropped, many great films don’t even get licensed by them at all anymore, and there’s a serious need in the space for a good Netflix competitor for films. There are many people attempting to do their own SVOD plays now, and many others doing well with sell through and rental, but I don’t think any of them can really compete. But lots of people with deep pockets see the need, and someone will move into this space this year. My bet: someone buys an existing platform that isn’t doing so hot and throws a few hundred million into ramping it up quickly.

5. We’ll see the first real global ultra-VOD release: I would’ve expected this last year, or the year prior, but this industry is slooooow. But this year, someone will buy global rights to a film, figure out how to market it to its audience globally and will launch it digitally around the world day/date and prior to any theatrical release. They’ll probably have to skip places like France, where this is pretty much illegal (really) and many countries won’t make a dent in revenues, but it will work well enough that others start to try it. But for this to work, prediction 6 has to come true.

6. We’ll figure out film marketing in the digital age: We’ve pretty much figured out how digital changes film production and distribution. Go figure, just 10 years ago, people debated this shit on festival panels regularly, but it all came to pass. What we haven’t figured out yet is how it changes marketing, and how to do it right. Yeah, we’ve got social blabbering covered, and plenty of people ruin my web video experience with pre-roll crap ads, but we all know – none of it is working. But we’re starting to see some good examples out there, and someone will put a few of them together and figure out how to make this all work to build enough buzz for a film that it can enter the cultural conversation the same way it used to in the (probably mythic) past. If they do, then we can stop relying on four-walling the Quad just to get a NYT review, and that shit can’t end soon enough for me.

7. Chris Dodd will be ousted from the MPAA: I have nothing against the guy personally, but I can’t imagine you can fuck up as bad as he did this year on the Sony debacle and keep your job. As I said on Facebook earlier this month: Jack Valenti would have never let this unravel so poorly. As soon as the Sony case started spiraling into Korea land (and this may not even be true, but the perception was all that mattered here) he should have been acting like the ex-government official he is and jumped on the phone with government and heimat-security officials to avoid giving in to this threat while remaining safe; he should have coordinated with NATO (theater owners, not the other Nato) to avoid this disaster in advance; he should have been doing diplomacy between the studios to avoid having one of them screw it up for all of them. Just a top of my head list for any qualified person in his position. The exact threat might be “new” but the problem was obvious for months if not longer. To my mind, the top Sony execs got blindsided but are getting too much blame, when it should land right at Dodd’s feet.

8. Life Itself will win the Oscar: Oscar predictions are tricky business, and while I’m not going out on a limb with this one (I am picking a favorite), it’s a chance to be unequivocal in my support. While I’ve always been a fan of Steve James and Kartemquin, I was surprised by how much I liked this movie. It’s not even my favorite documentary of the year, which is Particle Fever, but I was completely swept into the story, and think they’ve not only made a great film here, they’ve made the one film that might overcome the old Hollywood prejudices against Ebert (see the film) and actually win. It should. There are many great contenders, but this film was one of the few that made me think hard about my life, and think harder about how film encourages empathy (a subtext of the beginning of the film)., which we could all use a bit more of today. I hope this prediction is spot on.

9. This will be an important year for Net Neutrality: We had a lot of attacks on net neutrality in 2014. While those were pushed back, many of the lobbyists are now pressing the same issues we killed at the federal level down at the State and municipal level. With a presidential election coming up, the Republicans and Democrats will both be pressing their versions, and given that the Republicans are better at (Evilly) crafting the issue under new terminology that resonates with voters even when mind-numbingly wrong, we can expect them to gain some ground (They’ve been generally anti-net-neutrality). Meanwhile, all of the filmmaker support organizations are asleep at the wheel, so our voices won’t likely be heard on this issue, and literally nothing else could be nearly as important to the future of how our films get seen. Let’s hope we can at least follow the leaders in the tech space and help keep net neutrality alive a bit longer.

10. The Interview Experience will Boost Calls for Sharing the Numbers: I’m biased here as many know I am working on a film numbers project now, but among the many things that came out of The Interview disaster was that it became glaringly obvious to many more people that we know almost nothing about what’s being made on VOD. Mainstream press started to comment on this, the public started wondering why the heck we don’t know more about what’s being made on which platforms. I suspect we’ll see even more industry, press and public calls for bringing more transparency to the numbers, and it’s about time.

Those are the ten things I see in store for 2015. I suspect a lot of other things (privacy, hacking, world politics, etc) will see many more important developments, but that’s what I see for film. What I’d like to see happen probably won’t: To my mind, there hasn’t been a single invention that has changed culture the way Kickstarter did since the time of their founding. Literally nothing. I’d like to see someone launch something equally game-changing in 2015. It wouldn’t be anything to do with the crowd, but rather something that takes advantage of the net and the zeitgeist in a similarly game-changing fashion. I hope someone launches whatever this is in 2015, but I won’t be holding my breath, and I have no idea what it could be – or I wouldn’t be working in film!

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Blockchain and the transformation of the ownership of digital culture
- Posted on 3rd Nov
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Now that’s a title I’ve been waiting to use for awhile!
I’ve been thinking a bit lately about how Blockchain might transform industries beyond finance, like film, for example. If you don’t know what the f I’m talking about, you’re not alone. While many tech people know Blockchain as the fundamental technology behind Bitcoin, few of the rest of us know much about it, and I’m not calling myself an expert, but many people believe it is as transformative as anything to have come around in quite a long time – so one has to ask, will it transform multiple sectors, and if so, will film be one of them. I think….maybe, and Monegraph points towards that future.

Quickly and grossly simplified, Blockchain is the technology that allows Bitcoin to work – it’s a way to ensure that when I pay you with Bitcoin, I am using a real Bitcoin, that I haven’t also sold the same Bitcoin to someone else. It’s like a virtual ledger that can show the history/ownership of any file (not just Bitcoins, it could be a media file for example) and allows for a decentralized mechanism to trace ownership. If you want to really understand it read this or this, but importantly, the technology allows one to authenticate the a certain file is a unique, true “original” file. It also allows for many other complex interactions, including interfacing with devices. This solves many a problem when you’re trying to trade money and buy/sell things, and it might also solve the question of authenticity in a digital world. That’s where Walter Benjamin comes in (again) to the conversation.

As any (poor-out-of-work) liberal arts major knows, Walter Benjamin’s The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction summed up what happens when mechanical means make it easy to copy pretty much anything. The aura of an artwork is lost – what’s the value of an original when anyone can access a copy? Well, you can read that again to find out what happens (politics) but we’ve been wrestling with the nature of ownership in a digital world for a very long time, and Benjamin is a good reference point for the conversation.

Monegraph is a novel attempt to restore the aura of originality to digital artworks. It uses blockchain technology to authenticate an original work of art. You can watch this presentation on Monegraph, or watch the founder speaking about Monegraph for more details, but essentially you submit your work to Monegraph using your Twitter handle, the NameCoin client (you’ll spend a few pennies to get some NameCoins) and then you can create a Monegraph for your digital file. This is kinda like an interactive digital stamp that says: this here is the original artwork as created by the artist on this date. Yes, people can still make copies (legally or illegally), but only those created through a blockchain type transaction are “authentic.” The copies coexist, but if you want to buy and “original” work, you can do so through Monegraph.

As this same technology can be used for any file, it could be used to authenticate films, books, music, pretty much any digital file. In theory, it could be used to sell artist “special editions” of films, but it could theoretically be used instead of technologies like Ultraviolet, de-centralizing the control of the files, but allowing for authentication of “real” copies. Doing research today online, I found a writer, Ken Tindell, who has even proposed that the blockchain could be tied to your digital device, allowing it to read whether you have proper ownership of the file. So a Studio could sell you a film and you could own it and not have to worry about that file disappearing should Amazon suddenly stop carrying that title (which has happened). As Tindell proposes:

“The full features of Bitcoin transactions could be then used, enabling a movie to be rented, sold, re-sold, loaned, and so on. The issuer of the coloured coin for a movie would be the movie studio and they would control the terms of the market for their own movies (perhaps demanding a ‘droit de suite’ fee when it was transferred). Because the rules of the scheme would be open and transparent and the ownership rules (such as requiring the issuing studio to countersign transfers) embedded directly into the blockchain it would then be possible to define just what ‘ownership’ of a movie means.”

That’s pretty cool, and is probably just the tip of the Iceberg, because we’re at the beginning of this revolution. But as an indie producer, I could sell my film and control how you share it (giving various permissions or charging certain fees based on my proclivities) without using iTunes or Netflix or Amazon. Sure those services still help with discovery, but a blockchain powered VHX could be pretty cool. It could also be used to make a better system of copyright registration, so we don’t have to send VHS, beta tapes or film to the Library of Congress (though film is a great storage medium).

In theory, I could also tie the blockchain at the clip level of my film, enabling me to share the clip with another filmmaker for “free” up-front, but then demand payment based on how that subsequent film is bought and sold. This would revolutionize the clip licensing business, letting me pay based on how successful my film is instead of some theoretical price paid up front before I know if my film will even be seen. It could allow for remix in new ways as well, perhaps allowing effective monetization, while retaining some artistic control and de-centralizing the authority (go direct to the artist instead of some agency). This could work not just for films, but any digital artwork, meaning a(nother) transformation of the relationship between artists and audiences, as well as a transformation in the concept of ownership of culture.

Importantly, it’s also a move towards de-centralization of the ownership and trade in culture. As Taylor Davidson has written elsewhere, there’s a big trend online now towards decentralization as people start to realize the problems we’ve got with so much power being held by Amazon, Google, Facebook, Netflix and the NSA. Peer to peer transactions, like Bitcoin and Monegraph, among others, put more power back in the hands of people, and in this case give more power to artists connecting directly with audiences. As Taylor writes:

“But it’s possible to see how bitcoin, as a leading app for the blockchain, and a wide range of other peer-to-peer apps built on top of new mesh network technologies, could create unique, valuable, distributed alternatives to centralized approaches. Alternatives, not complete replacements, but viable alternatives could create knock-on effects at how the stacks do business. And the time for it could be now, as people are beginning to see the broader implications of the centralized Internet, and it’s feeding a burgeoning appetite for alternatives to the stacks. Bitcoin, multipeer connectivity, and mesh networking may seem far-fetched, but they could be signals that the next movement is already here.”

I’ve not given enough thought yet to figure out all of the potential uses and possible futures this affords, but that’s a panel/conversation I’d like to attend at some film festival (instead of another transmedia panel).

Got any ideas on how else this might be used?

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Join/Stop the Internet Slowdown
- Posted on 5th Sep
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People keep trying to ruin the internet, so I keep hollerin’ back at them. September 10th is the next big battle, as thousands of tech companies, blogs, news sites, etc etc all join together to bring attention to the issue by doing a symbolic internet slowdown to convince people to send comments to the FCC – which they stop taking just a few days later. There was a lot of attention on this back earlier this Summer, but those (continuing) Summer days tend to slow the news cycle and there’s been a slow-down in commenting. So get your heads out of your nethers and get involved. Here’s how.

It’s easy, just click that link, add some code to your website and install a fake slowdown swirl to your website, your Twitter/Facebook or other Avatars, sign the petition and learn why you should care. You should…quite literally, if we allow Comcast, Time Warner, Verizon and AT&T to control what gets seen, and how fast, we’ll break the internet as we know it. Need proof? Turn on your TV and try, just try, to use the interface. Do you want them making decisions about how the internet works too? Didn’t think so. Get involved.
Three Cool Things from this Summer
- Posted on 2nd Sep
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I took a much needed month vacation from social media, blogging and pretty much all emails through August, and am just back, feeling refreshed and ready to share things again. Ok, I actually left Twitter and LinkedIn for two months and won’t be back, they just don’t do it for me, and I left Facebook and other social media (including reading any blogs) for August, and might leave Facebook for good as well. But I didn’t leave Instagram, it was the one thing I enjoyed using while on vacation, and frankly, I wish it was the only social media anymore (though the new ads suck bad).

Anyway, here’s a few things I enjoyed towards the end of my vacation and/or am enjoying now:

Hope for Film by Ted Hope

This is no big discovery, as Ted has quite a following and there’s been a fair bit of press, but given that his new book was launched during the doldrums of August when no one pays attention to anything, I thought it might be worth plugging Ted’s new book for anyone who missed its launch. Ted has been a leader in the indie film sector for decades, and has been writing prolifically about indie film for the last few years. Given his numerous, insightful posts about the industry, I was skeptical I would learn anything new, but Ted did a great job of speaking less to the future of film (his usual posts), and more about his time in the industry from his first days to his hopes for the future. This look back at what he loved, what kept him involved and what he learned while producing some of the best indie films out there is truly a must-read for anyone interested in the industry, especially up and coming producers, of which we need many more who can fill Ted’s shoes (and those of his contemporaries like Christine Vachon, et al) and help make sure masterful films are made and seen today. Full disclosure: I am friends with Ted and we have been business partners on a couple of things, but I can honestly say, I loved reading this on my vacation and would recommend it regardless.

US Open SessionsOne of the more interesting uses of data right now has to be the James Murphy US Open Sessions – Murphy, the LCD SoundSystem frontman, has worked with IBM and the US Open to develop an ongoing music site that utilizes data from the US Open tennis matches to make interesting music. The system has an algorithm – that I can’t begin to understand in spite of listening to it while watching several matches – that combines weather, fan sentiment, the actual playing going on, and more to make music. But it’s not all data, as the Guardian explains, Murphy had a lot of artistic input into the sound: “Murphy is collaborating with a developer called Patrick Gunderson, creative director at Tool, who devised an algorithm to turn tennis plays into sound. With this software in place, Gunderson built a synthesiser-like interface – something Murphy could use to design and tweak each component of the music.” Definitely worth listening to as the US Open plays out for the next week.

Art Everywhere

This technically ran through August and is over now, but luckily, in NYC at least, the MTA is pretty slow to remove subway and bus ads and artwork, so I am still running into art daily. Art Everywhere was a project modeled on a similar initiative in the UK where five museums picked samples of historic/important American art, and then allowed the public to vote on their favorites online. The 58 “winners” were shown online, on billboards, in subways, and various places around the US. While some of the selections were a bit populist, these were much better billboards to see than the norm. Check the (horrendous to use) map on their site, or just look in any station. Some are simply billboards, but a few were cleverly placed in locations such as along stairwells, etc.

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Come see DamNation for Free in a Patagonia Store
- Posted on 4th Jun
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Please join us for screenings nationwide at Patagonia retail stores.
Check www.damnationfilm.com/screenings for details and times.

“Ed Abbey would have shit his pants. This film changes everything, everything.” – Katie Lee
[Her response to the question “What would have Ed Abbey thought about DamNation?]

After a great theatrical run, fest screenings and a tour, we’re excited to launch our DamNation online this week! On Thursday, June 5th, we screen in 23 Patagonia retail stores nationwide and on Friday, June 6th, we release the film (in the US) for digital viewing through Vimeo and at www.damnationfilm.com. The film will be $5.99 to rent and $9.99 to buy. If you have not seen the film yet, your wait is over! For all of you, please share the film with your family and friends, with your help, we can change the game for rivers in the US (and beyond!).

You’ve also got just a little while longer to enter our photo contest (on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter), and plenty of time to add your name to our petition with over 25,000 signatures calling on Obama to “Crackdown on Deadbeat Dams.” If you live in NYC, I hope to see you at the Patagonia SoHo store screening. If not, join another screening, or buy the film!
Film Fest Experimentation – Cork VoDo Edition
- Posted on 22nd May
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I always say that film festivals need to innovate and experiment more, and James Mullighan at the Cork Film Festival has done just that. From his press release:

… Cork Film Festival releases its 2013 edition highlights on pioneering video on demand platform VODO on a pay what you want basis. Vodo.net/cork …
… Three week project sees seven garlanded shorts and seven full feature films released by Ireland’s oldest film festival in a global first for film festivals …
… Features include Kathy Leichter’s Here one Day, Tony Palmer’s reissued 1974 Leonard Cohen biopic Bird on a Wire, and the Dublin Filmbase filmmaking MA production How To Be Happy, starring Brian Gleeson …
… Lion’s share of takings go straight to indie filmmakers’ pockets, with Fest’s take going directly into the pot for its new feature film Spirit of the Festival Award …
Mid Cannes Film Festival, attended by Cork Film Festival’s Creative Director James Mullighan and Head of Programme and Editorial Don O’Mahoney, the Festival launches its very first video on demand initiative, with seven shorts and seven features being retailed on a pay what you want basis, alongside bonus content.
Innovative platform VODO, which careful curates themed bundles of content, is working with a film Festival for the first time. Vodo.net/cork.
The initiative has three tiers: Pay What you Want (four shorts and one feature, including Made in Cork prize winner Yvonne’ Keane’s Stolen, and Filmbase Ireland’s How to be Happy, starring Brian Gleeson); Beat the Average (three features and three shorts, including biopic of writer / chess master John Healy Barbaric Genius, and Cork Fest 2013 opening night short Mechanic, starring Syl Fox); and Beat the Premium (including Tony Palmer’s recently reissued 1974 Leonard Cohen doc Bird on a Wire, and John Kastner’s prize winner mental health sensational doc Not Criminally Responsible).
“We’ve been working with Jamie King and the team at VODO since straight after the Fest last year”, said James Mullighan, Creative Director, Cork Film Festival.
“In this day of screeching web noise, I really admire the platform’s loving, carefully curated approach to films and more. They were the ideal choice to launch this experiment in distribution. I am hopeful it will be popular with the thousands and thousands of fans of the Cork Film Festival in Ireland, Europe and amongst the global Irish diaspora, who fondly wish they could attend the Festival, but cannot. I’m grateful to and proud of the independent directors and producers who lit up our Festival in November last year to trust Jamie and I with their babies”.
Once payment handling costs have been deducted, VODO – who levy no extra charges other than their 25% sales fee – hand all the proceeds to Cork Film Festival. The Festival sends 70% of that straight to the filmmakers, ringfencing 5% for its new €1,500 feature film Gradam Spiorad na Féile / Spirit of the Festival Award, which takes a bow during the Festival’s 59th Edition, 7-16 November.
“Cork’s Bundle shows a real engagement with online culture and experimentation in the transmedia sphere”, commented Jamie King, CEO and Founder of VODO, which has recently successfully promoted Not Safe for Work and Big Brother bundles.
“When you let customers set the price for themselves,’ says VODO’s Jamie King, ‘they can turn out to be surprisingly generous. The average price paid for the Cork Bundle is currently $11.20. That’s a win both for audiences and the filmmakers.”
“I had a wonderful time when I was honoured to be invited to Cork last November as filmmaker in residence”, remembered Tony Palmer, celebrated British music film biographer and documentarian, whose Leonard Cohen film Bird on a Wire played at the Festival, as well as his new Benjamin Britten feature Nocturne, and his entire 7 hour, 46 minute dramatic reconstruction of the life of composer Richard Wagner, the last film Richard Burton even made.
“The Cork Film Festival is going out on a limb to bring its films to a wider audience. This should be celebrated, and I’m delighted to be involved.
The bundle went live on Wednesday 14 May, the opening day of Cannes International Film Festival, and runs until Tuesday 3 June.
Net neutrality, Comcast, filmmakers, artists & those who represent them
- Posted on 14th May
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Unless you’ve been doing nothing but watching movies and TV, which is what they want you to do, don’t you know – the FCC has proposed some rule changes that might seriously f–k up the internet as we know it, and simultaneously, Comcast wants to buy Time Warner and control even more of our viewing options and ways to get online. Both of these things are horribly bad ideas, and both should be opposed by anyone who cares about indie films, art, music and/or the internet (and innovation, and…). You would think the organizations/companies that represent or work with all of us would be up in arms, assisting the fight, but as far as I can tell, most are just passing the buck to the Future of Music Coalition (more on that below).

I don’t need to add much to the debate here (I’ve been writing about it since at least 2006), but I want to make sure I help spread the word. You can learn more about why this stuff matters elsewhere. Public Knowledge is a good resource on the Comcast deal, and Free Press and Fight for the Future are doing a great job on net neutrality. Fight for the Future have also launched a great #StopTheSlowLane campaign that I urge you to run on your blogs/websites. Fred Wilson has a great post on why this matters to start-ups and VC’s. Dan Aronson of Fandor wrote about why this matters for filmmakers at IndieWire. The Washington Post has a great article on why this matters for indie films, and she links to some others on the issue. Probably the best article on it came out today from Astra Taylor who sums it up well:

Artists need to take note: Net neutrality may be the biggest media and communications policy battle ever waged, and the stakes could not be higher for independent voices. Unlike the old days when different mediums had discrete distribution channels, we are now utterly dependent on one network for everything: we read books and articles, watch television and films and listen to music online, just as we study, work and socialize there. The network underpinning all of this must be neutral and nondiscriminatory if we are to make good on the remarkable democratic potential of the Internet. Creators need to join the fight to defend this fundamental attribute of the digital ecosystem before it’s too late.

Further to that, if Comcast is allowed to take over Time Warner, it will limit competition in the space, lead to higher prices and less choice. We all know this, in spite of their arguments to the contrary. But even worse, and why the merger really matters, is that they’ll have more control over how most of us access the internet. The combination of these two things leads to some scary possible scenarios, as described in the links above, and here from The Wrap.

As I said, I don’t need to add much here, but I know some people who should, all of whom claim to help independent filmmakers and none of whom seem to be doing anything or very little about these issues. I don’t just mean the big dogs in the room, I also mean the smaller actors – regional film fests, arthouses, video start-ups and everyone else who has a bigger vehicle than I have in which to carry the message to a bigger population should be devoting their home page, their film screen and any other tools they have to spreading the word. I am friends with the leaders and staff of many of these nonprofits and companies, and I know they’re busy, have potential sponsor conflicts, boards who must approve political matters and/or just don’t understand the issue themselves, but it’s no excuse. Every organization and company that purports to represent indie filmmakers (and artists generally) should take action now. There’s still time and you can get the widget here. You can even use it as a filmmaker, or blogger with a small audience like me. I’m going to install it now…with some tech support.
Brands and Impact: Patagonia and DamNation
- Posted on 1st May
- Category:
I wrote about this back during our premiere at SXSW, but the Los Angeles Times just ran a great article about DamNation and how Patagonia and team produced the film and are now (working with me) distributing it and marketing it. There’s also some great quotes from the filmmakers about their thoughts on working with brands, and with the lead scientist and producer of the film on why dams need to be removed.

I am biased, working on this project, but I think this is one of the most significant developments in the doc world this year – brands working smartly with indie filmmakers and scientists to have a greater impact on important environmental issues. I’d love to see more of these experiments, and am working behind the scenes to make this happen with others.

We open in NYC on May 9 at IFC Center (tickets on sale Monday), LA on May 16 at Laemmle NoHo and many other cities. Film Sprout is setting up over 300 community screenings, and we’ll be premiering the film in most Patagonia stores for free on June 5. You can find all screenings here. On June 6 we’ll be available for download to own and rent through Vimeo (you can pre-order now), and yes, we’ll also be on cable on demand, iTunes, Netflix and many other platforms as well. All of them can be found from the website.

My favorite quote in the article comes from founder Yvon Chouinard:

Chouinard said “DamNation” ultimately builds on what almost every child was taught by his or her parent. “If you make a mess, you clean it up. You don’t just walk away from it,” he said. The time has come, he said, to tear down, rather than build, more dams.

“I hope this film leads to a revolution,” Chouinard said. “A revolution about how we think about our water, and how we think about our rivers.”
April Art: Chelsea & LES Edition
- Posted on 13th Apr
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Last week was the Upper East Side, now I’ll cover the best of what I’ve seen in Chelsea and the Lower East Side, again in order of what I liked the most. There are a bunch of new shows, and I haven’t made it to all of them, but here’s the ones I’ve liked thus far.

Vik Muniz: Album at Sikkema Jenkins through May 10

Vik Muniz, New Car, Album

Vik Muniz is one of the hotter photographers right now for good reason, and this show proves why – because he’s speaking to our culture’s pastiche-making, copying and nostalgia all at the same time through the medium, by creating collages that make up a bigger picture. His “nostalgia postcards” series stand out for their multi-color takes on iconic, now ruined sites (the WTC for example), but my favorites are the family photo album collages such as “Car” in the photo here.

Friedrich Kunath “The Temptation to Exist (May Contain Nuts)” at Andrea Rosen through April 26th

Canvases pained to resemble note-pad paper, with dreamscape images exploding from the page, all with not-so-subtle environmental apocalypse messaging and plenty of surrealistic dream touches, accompanied by rotting fruit on cat-scratch poles and vibrantly colored carpets. What more could you want?

Robert Longo, Gang of Cosmos at Metro Pictures until May 23

Longo re-creates 12 abstract expressionist masterpieces in B&W charcoal paintings. Detailed, very much duplicates of the originals as studied in museums and through photographs. Make sure to flip through the Longo catalogues while at the gallery, as they represent some amazing past work by the artist. Pretty and pretty nice.

Joel Otterson 1980s and 1990s at Elizabeth Dee (link is to Time Out since the gallery’s website sucks so bad)

Joel Otterson, Divine Intervention

Joel Otterson is just one half of this show with Ryan Trecartin, but steals the show with his pre-steampunk sculptures. Of course steal a show from the much over-hyped Trecartin is pretty simple, and gets simpler when you were as flash-forward thinking and fun-making as Otterson. See the show, but avoid the gallery’s website which is a disaster. Every gallery’s website makes restaurant websites look ghastly (and those are among the worst), but this one doesn’t even work.

Urs Fischer: Mermaid/Pig Bro W/Hat at Gagosian 104 Delancey St through May 23rd

Urs Fischer: Mermaid

One of two shows right now where the venue is as interesting as the art. Gagosian took over an old Chase branch on Delancey St and turned it into a gallery. It’s hard to find, still looks like a bank (with the neon Chase sign inside and out), contains the old safes and is now filled with debaucherous art from Urs Fischer and his collaborators. These clay sculptures (now bronze) were made collaboratively with 1500 other people in 2013 in California. From Mermaids to pig-fucking, yes really, you find something new in every room. Someone finally did something appropriate with the Chase brand.

Corin Hewitt: The Third Station at Laurel Gitlen, through May 11th

Hewitt’s gigantic police station/abandoned store-front sculptures are an interesting companion piece to the ongoing NSA spying disaster, and make for interesting contemplation with their surveillance cameras capturing empty-ness. Detailed work, including detritus in the back alleys remind me of former East German ruins – another state brought down (in part) by its over-zealous capturing of data. What’s real? What’s fake? Definitely topics on your mind after this exhibit.

Florian Pumhosl at Miguel Abreu through April 27th

The art in this show is good, but the real reason to visit is to see Abreu’s new gallery in this block-long loft warehouse building. Amazing space with so much potential, and a great inaugural show. Pumhoesl is up to some cerebral art with these 12 paintings based on ancient rabbinical maps, and 6 more based on Georgian letters. Austere, minimalist and way above my head, but I believe the press release which explains it like this: “Pumhösl’s restaging of these sources exploits the threshold between the referent and the space of the image.” Yep, and what better way to investigate a new space on the artistic map.