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Wednesday, May 11, 2011
Film / Performance Art BUSK! — an exploration of Charlotte’s street art culture
Posted By Jeff Taylor on Wed, May 11, 2011 at 11:44 AM
April Denée describes herself as the type to stop an interesting-looking person on the street and ask them about their story.
It’s a trait that no doubt helped her as a freelance journalist. It has now brought her to the unexpected path of writing and directing a feature-length documentary, titled BUSK!; it explores the importance of encouraging street art and performance as a vital part of a city’s cultural health and vitality.
Filmmaking may be a new passion of Denée’s, but it is starting to take precedence over her other endeavors. “Give me a meager salary — just enough to live on — put a camera in my hand, stick me in a room with my editing suite, and let me be happy. It’s that simple,” she states with obvious determination.
The BUSK! website describes the project as “…a character-driven documentary about how a small, emerging city can — and should — encourage street art and performance toward its own social, cultural, and economic growth.”
Charlotte has a sometimes tenuous relationship with its budding music and arts community. Never more so than when that art or music is presented outdoors, free from galleries or commercially backed and publicly sanctioned amphitheaters and performance centers.
The issue is heating up as of late, with proposed changes to the noise ordinance that left many musicians, small business owners and fans of live music up in arms — taking to Facebook and online petitions to vent their frustration and propose softer revisions. The proposed changes have now been scrapped and the second, revised proposal is still being debated.
Not content to simply make a film, Denée also organized an Uptown busking event called Buskapalooza last week. The idea was to both raise awareness of Charlotte buskers and the ongoing BUSK! fundraising campaign.
A grant from the N.C. Arts Council has covered some of the necessary funding for the project, but supporters of the project can also make donations via the film’s IndieGoGo page to help finance the film in time for an expected December premiere here in Charlotte. Rewards are available to funders, with different incentives for various donation levels.
Buskapalooza was intended to be a one-off event, but it now looks like it could become a Charlotte staple. “The event was so successful that, even before it was over, people were asking when we were going to have the next one,” says Denée. “I'm already in talks to host another Buskapalooza this summer, so if anyone missed the first event, I hope they can make it to the second. And even if they can't manage that, they'll be able to see Buskapalooza footage on the big screen once the documentary is completed, since the event was documented as part of the film.”
While she’s clearly excited about the possibility of another Buskapalooza, she hopes Charlotte musicians won’t wait around for an excuse to get out there and share their art. She’s confident in the likelihood of that outcome, saying, “I can at least say that the buskers who participated in the event last Friday are now more comfortable to go out and busk on their own, having learned about and experienced first-hand the busking-related laws we discussed as part of event preparation and that appear on the backs of their Buskapalooza event badges.”
Watch the recently released BUSK! trailer below, and check out those aforementioned busking laws if it moves you to take to the streets with instrument in hand.
BUSK! (documentary trailer) - street art & performance, grassroots creative culture from April Denée on Vimeo.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Film / Events NoDa Film Festival returns with The Battle of Algiers
Posted By Manoj P Kesavan on Tue, Apr 20, 2010 at 10:24 AM
Charlotte isn’t a great place to be if you are a film buff (especially since the takeover of all independent theaters by Regal). Many notable independent films and documentaries never play in town, and we never get to see them unless and until they are released on DVD.
It is in that context that our frequent contributor Jeff Jackson started the Noda Film Festival in early 2006. Starting with African-American Film, in 2 years’ time we were treated to seven exciting and different fares, which became popular far beyond the imagination of the founder. But then it also fell victim to the same affliction that many such non-profit grassroots ventures suffer from in this town — as the attendance kept rising, the funding and volunteer help kept dropping, until finally the series was put on hold.
So it is great news that the festival is returning this weekend after a hiatus of nearly 2 years. The reborn NoDa Film Festival won’t be a “festival” in the conventional sense, but a series made up of a single special film shown every few months. The first one would be this Sunday (April 25), and it will start with a (literal) bang with the legendary and controversial 1966 French war film, The Battle of Algiers — a movie that won three Oscar nominations including the Best Director, pretty rare feat for a foreign language film even now, and extremely unusual then. Banned in France soon after its release, it soon became one of the most influential movies of all time. This realistic recreation of a historic insurgency apparently became a must-see for all rebel/guerilla groups around the world, from the Black Panthers, the IRA and the Baader-Meinhof Group, to the more recent and dangerous ones like some of the Al-Qaeda factions. It also became a valuable lesson for those who fight such insurgencies, as the Pentagon screened it in 2003 in connection to the Iraq war. (Watch the trailer here.)
The new series of Noda Film Festival is done in collaboration with God City — perhaps the most promising and exciting young artists’ collective of this region — and The Light Factory, the premier film and photography institution in town. The festival, however, still seeks and needs your support beyond attendance. Get in touch with them if you can volunteer or help in any other way. It’s in all our interests to keep it going.
Info: “The Battle of Algiers” @ The Neighborhood Theatre, NoDa. Sunday, April 25 at 4:00pm. Cover: $3. More info at www.nodafilmfestival.org.
