March Newsletter

Ann Arbor Film Festival going strong, Creative Chambers updates and more...

March and all of its madness is upon us. Hope you all enjoyed your St. Patrick's Day festivities and that your bracket remains intact. If not, don't fret. The Ann Arbor Film Festival is right around the corner. All About Ann Arbor goes in depth on the festival and has all of your bases covered. We also share some news from our Creative Chambers program that has happened recently in this month's newsletter.

Your guide to the 57th annual Ann Arbor Film Festival

By Meredith Bruckner - Community News Producer, All About Ann Arbor

AAFF's Opening Night Party at the Michigan Theater on March 20, 2018 (Credit: Doug Coombe)

ANN ARBOR - The 57th annual Ann Arbor Film Festival is just around the corner, and it is going to be a jam-packed event with 143 films and extensive performances, exhibitions, installations, speaker series and parties downtown.

From March 26 to March 31, filmmakers and festivalgoers from around the world will descend upon Ann Arbor to participate in the oldest experimental and avant-garde film festival in North America.

This year, as a result of staff changes, the festival's executive director, Leslie Raymond, took on the additional role of overseeing the programming of the event.

While she is typically focused on the logistics of running such a large festival, Raymond said she enjoyed being a part of the creative side of things. But narrowing down 3,000 submissions to 143 features is no small feat.

"We have this very robust process with lots of volunteer support to do that," said Raymond. "In the first round, we make an opening for anyone who knows us and knows the festival who wants to be a part of that process. Every film gets seen by two people in the first round. And then it travels up into the other rounds."

Raymond said that, in round two and up, the festival's screening advisors judge the remaining films. The advisors are either veterans of the festival, filmmakers or professors with a broad range of knowledge of experimental films and filmmaking.

"It’s all about the conversation that the films are having together," she said. "Each program should be comprehensive, have a range of dynamics amongst the films, have a range of techniques, pacing, and have an experimental, animation, documentary, narrative mix to it."

Leslie Raymond introduces a program at the 56th AAFF on March 23, 2018 (Credit: Doug Coombe)

2019 highlights

During the selection process, the team tries to pick out themes connecting some of the films to create special programming categories.

"We don’t set out to say, 'Here’s a theme and let’s program towards it,'" said Raymond. "It’s more like, 'What are we noticing as the programs are coming together? And what are the things we think people might relate to?'"

This year, Fierce Women and Black Voices were two recurring themes.

On Friday, March 29, and Saturday, March 30, there will be screenings of films featuring these themes and highlighting women in the arts and African filmmakers.

The 18th annual Out Night will take place on Thursday, March 28, with a screening of several films celebrating queer cinema.

On Saturday, March 30, the popular Almost All Ages program, for ages 6 and up, at the Michigan Theater, will show a variety of family-friendly documentary, narrative, experimental and animated films. Tickets are $6 per person.

Also screening that weekend, starting on Thursday, March 28, are the festival's Animation Highlights.

Art installation highlight

On Friday, March 29, a wearable art exhibition by University of Michigan Stamps School students will take place at 9 p.m. in the Michigan Theater Grand Foyer. Under professor Rebekah Modrak's direction, students in the course Dressing Up + Down are given a theme and are tasked to design clothes to wear to a pop-up event and exhibition.

For the film festival, they were tasked with designing outfits based on cartoonist Sally Cruikshank's colorful and psychedelic short "Quasi at the Quackadero."

Last year, the class designed costumes inspired by the sinking of the Titanic and re-enacted the event at Canham Natatorium.

Michigan filmmakers

Ten filmmakers presenting at this year's festival hail from Ann Arbor, Detroit, Ferndale and Ypsilanti. Another filmmaker from Japan is a Stamps School alumna. While not all of the films are Michigan-centric, two of the films take a deeper look into the neighborhoods of Detroit while another studies the Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore.

Tickets

Screenings, unless otherwise noted:

• $12 general admission
• $8 students/seniors/AAFF members

Festival pass
Includes opening night parties, all film screenings and afterparties:

• $100 general admission
• $85 students/seniors/AAFF members

Weekend festival pass
Includes all film screenings and afterparties on Friday, Saturday and Sunday:

• $60 general admission
• $50 students/seniors/AAFF members

Opening night party and screening
Tuesday, March 26, 6:30-8 p.m., Michigan Theater:

• $50 general admission
• $40 students/seniors
• $40 AAFF members/Michigan Theater members
• $12 for screening only
• $150 annual director's fundraiser, opening night party and screening

Buy tickets

For the full festival schedule, click here.

Raymond recommends that first-time attendees not delve too deeply into the program lineup.

"One of the things I find myself telling people this year is: Come when you feel like coming," said Raymond. "Just try it. You’re not going to like everything anyway. But there will be things that you really love."

Marquette welcomes three talented individuals to the community as part of their Creative Residency program

The Creative Residency has become one of the more successful programs derived from the Marquette Creative Chamber or Evolve Marquette as they are affectionately known.  The concept is to choose three applicants from lauded veterans to emerging artists – from anyone who can articulate a strong personal vision and provide a compelling portfolio – working within analog or digital technologies in advertising, architecture, art education, technology, culture, design, fashion, film, literature, music, performance or visual arts.

This year Evolve Marquette has selected Rachel Smith, Christoper Thompson, and Julie Benda to join the Creative Residency.  They will live and work in Marquette from March 1st through May 31st.

Learn more about this years creative residents by reading the article below or by attending next weeks 'Seat at the Table' event in Marquette.

Article

Marquette to Welcome New Artists-in-Residence, by Brian Cabell, Word on the Street Marquette

Event

Seat at the Table, Wednesday, March 27th, 6pm @ the Marquette Chamber of Commerce

2018 Marquette creative resident, Breesa Culver, releases podcast; The State of Superior focuses on authentic stories reflecting U.P. culture

Breesa Culver is a professional storyteller, fundraiser, strategist, and dot connector. She’s also an amateur ceramics maker, a serial club starter, and an enthusiastic traveler.   Breesa, along with Jason Powers, have produced a podcast to collect and broadcast stories about the U.P. One part intimate storytelling, one part oral history project, the podcast showcases first-person accounts with ambivalent endings, strange coincidences, and brushes with the ever-dwindling True Wild.   Do you have a story to share? Or a tip? Email her at MidwestMysteriesPodcast@gmail.com.   LISTEN TO THE STATE OF SUPERIOR HERE

Grand Rapids Chamber pushing creative fields

Organization's goal is for region to be known as a hub for creative talent.

March 8, 2018 - By Justin Dawes, Grand Rapids Business Journal

The Grand Rapids Chamber of Commerce is making a push to enhance creative fields locally.   The chamber’s goal is to build on the creative culture, retain talent by promoting partnerships and, ultimately, attract more talent to the area.   “We understand that our competitiveness as a region is directly impacted by the creative talent,” said Dante Villarreal, the chamber’s vice president of business and talent development. “Our goal is for this region to be known as a hub for creative talent.”   The chamber is implementing its plan after it and four other organizations received funding in 2017 from the Michigan Film and Digital Media Office to support the creative economy, targeting fields such as advertising, visual and performing arts, crafts, architecture, music, public relations, graphic design, film and fashion.   The chamber has been planning the initiative over the past year, using input from several focus groups, including one with organizations that support creative talent and one with businesses that consume the talent, Villarreal said.   Creative fields in particular house a lot of freelancers and small businesses, and the goal is to connect them to larger businesses in the area that could utilize those services.   Input from the focus groups seemed to have a common theme, he said. The primary issue is companies too often look outside the region — often toward the East and West coasts — for creative services when much of what they need can be found in West Michigan.   “Let’s shop local first,” Villarreal said.   A lot of the area’s film industry traction stopped when state incentives for filmmakers were halted in 2015, Villarreal said, but many of those people are still here, for example.   RC Caylan is a locally based fashion designer who has dressed celebrities for red carpet events and whose work has been displayed in high-end fashion shows, most recently New York Fashion Week Spring/Summer 2019.   “I’m based in Grand Rapids. I’m out there in the different states but not here in our city,” Caylan said. “I think that’s the bigger problem. We’re not making our talent blossom here in our city.”   A Filipino transplant who graduated from the GRCC fashion program in 2015, Caylan has a studio in downtown Grand Rapids, at 80 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 308, where he is available by appointment for wedding dress design and other services. Though he said his prices are more reasonable, local women often shop from designers based elsewhere, perhaps because they don’t know he exists or because his name is not as widely known.   Villarreal said he believes the first barrier is making companies and the public aware of the talent here. To start, the chamber is spreading the word among its 2,400 members. The chamber soon will launch a page on its website where companies can post RFPs for creative services. The chamber also is adding a creative business category to its annual EPIC awards.   Part of the initiative includes helping these small businesses learn better marketing and other business practices, such as how to submit bids and establish contracts.   He said there is low participation from creative professionals in chamber events in general. Because they have such low involvement, he said it’s difficult to quantify how many actually are here.   “Creative businesses sometimes don't realize they’re businesses,” Villarreal said.   The goal is to raise their participation in chamber events by 20 percent in the next year, he said. The chamber kicked off the initiative with a networking event Feb. 27 and plans to continue hosting connections and other events.   The chamber is receiving input on the initiative from its Creative Chamber council, consisting of multiple local creative professionals: Jacob Pollak, Ferris State; Jori Bennett, ArtPrize; Shayna Harris, SLSA Creative; Caylan, RC Caylan Atelier; Chris Randall, Fulvew Productions; Kris Mathis, SpringGR; Steve Zaagman, Spectrum, GR Swing Society; Laura Armenta, Armentality Studio; Dana Friis-Hansen, Grand Rapids Art Museum; AJ Hills, city of Grand Rapids; and Joe Voss, Creative Many Michigan.

Ann Arbor Creative Chamber hosts Workforce Pipeline Summit; Governor Gretchen Whitmer as keynote speaker

This past Monday the Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti Regional Chamber with the support of their Creative Chamber, hosted the Workforce Pipeline Summit at the Morris Lawrence Building on the campus of Washtenaw Community College.   The mission of the Workforce Pipeline Summit is to strengthen Ann Arbor's local workforce and community through alleviating the short- and long-term pipeline shortage. Ann Arbor is committed to identifying, investing in, training, and shining a light on the available and willing hidden talent pool in the area.   By promoting locally owned businesses and employing people from wide swaths of the community, Ann Arbor can realize sustained community growth for the benefit of all.   The workforce pipeline deficit is a community-wide problem in the Ann Arbor region that has massive economic sustainability ramifications. Ann Arbor, as a community, especially businesses, came together to determine how they can Look Local, Build Local, and Hire Local talent for the diverse range of jobs that need to be filled.   One of the highlights of the event was having Governor Gretchen Whitmer present one of the keynote addresses. Governor Whitmer highlighted portions of her 2019 budget and specifically referenced how some of her proposed programs could address the workforce pipeline shortages in Ann Arbor and throughout the State of Michigan.   PHOTOS FROM THE 2019 WORKFORCE PIPELINE SUMMIT

Michigan Council for Arts and Cultural Affairs releases guidelines for FY19 and FY20 grant programs

The Michigan Council for Arts and Cultural Affairs (MCACA) recently updated and released guidelines for grant applications for the remaining FY 2019 and the upcoming FY 2020.   The MCACA offers Operational Support Grants, Project Support Grants, Capital Improvement Grants, Arts in Education Grants, and New Leader Grants.  Interested in applying or learning more?   VIEW MCACA GRANT APPLICATION GUIDELINES

Upcoming Events

Mar. 22 - Brew and View (Presented by Capital City Film Festival) - Friday - Lansing

Mar. 22 - Hell's Half Mile Film Series: "Three Identical Strangers" - Bay City

Mar. 22 - Relaxer + Q&A with director Joel Potrykus - UICA, Grand Rapids

Mar. 26-31 - Ann Arbor Film Festival - Ann Arbor

Mar. 31 - Fairview St. 10th Anniversary Screening - Robin Theater, Lansing

Apr. 6-13 - West Michigan Design Week - Grand Rapids

Apr. 10-14 - Freep Film Festival - Detroit and surrounding

Apr. 11-21 - Capital City Film Festival - Lansing