[Note: Reeler editor S.T. VanAirsdale is taking the week off, but the blog is in the good hands of trusted friends and colleagues; click here for other entries in the series. Brian Newman is the executive director of National Video Resources, a non-profit organization supporting filmmakers and other artists in independent media. He blogs at Springboard Media.]
During a recent dinner with a filmmaker, our conversation turned to the death of the Association of Video and Filmmakers, a non-profit collective better known as AIVF. “What’s wrong with New York that we can’t have one good organization?” she asked, “Austin, San Francisco, even Cleveland all have great film organizations and us? Nothing.”
She was exaggerating, but her point was valid. The conversations about the demise of AIVF have made it clear that they had problems, but also that filmmakers have unmet needs–a place to meet, network, find crew, collaborate, to advocate on their behalf, to find in-depth information and to exhibit their work. Some aspects of these needs are served by certain local groups and by many new online companies and blogs, but many feel that we don’t have a place that is clearly identified as the New York film organization; where a filmmaker new to town can walk in the door and feel like they are connecting to the community. This would seem a bit odd in the supposed independent film (and cultural) capital of the world.
I have posited that AIVF’s demise is just the first fallout of a larger crisis facing similar organizations. At National Video Resources, the organization I manage, we’ve recognized this and are changing our model to adapt to the changing times–things like the decrease of governmental and foundation support, or the impact of new technologies on the needs of artists. Like everyone else, we need to adapt and think differently about our business, and like everyone else, we may fail. Almost every other organization has called me up to deny there is a crisis or that it applies to them. Let’s take this on face value and say that the crisis isn’t affecting everyone; the fact remains that no one has taken a lead at picking up the pieces of AIVF or designing better ones to take their place. This tells me that the field may not be in crisis, but it definitely has a cash flow problem.
Add to this the particulars of New York–chiefly, rising rents affecting filmmakers and cultural groups alike, and it seems that a conversation is needed about where we go from here, and what is on the horizon. We need some more imagination, some dreaming about what New York filmmakers deserve.

What if one of the larger groups in town could add just a few things to their already great programs and become the New York hub for the community? The Tribeca Film Institute, for example, has the power to build a downtown home for filmmakers, and could easily build programs to rival Sundance, but with a focus on the “edginess” of New York. Or IFP could become the perfect organization if it added some advocacy and better networking for its members (kudos to them, however, for the “Do It Yourself” additions to Independent Film Week).
What if some of the smaller groups (the DocuClubs, Film/Video Arts and similar-sized groups) considered mergers to better serve more people? There are benefits to a diversity of groups, true, but there’s too much competition for the same funding and audiences right now. What if just one of these groups would move to Brooklyn (you know, where filmmakers live) and build a home there? What if we all made a case to foundations, the city and the public that independent filmmakers are crucial to New York’s creative economy? What if we used the demise of AIVF to spur a greater conversation about what is needed?
Last week brought news that shows one group is dreaming about “what’s next?” Downtown Community Television (DCTV) announced the receipt of major grants–over $2 million–to build a downtown home for filmmakers and audiences. Plans are still in the works, but they’ll be able to offer education, facilities, equipment, screening rooms, servers and a networking location for documentary filmmakers, audiences and the surrounding communities. DCTV’s focus won’t solve all the issues, but they are clearly dreaming.
What’s needed next are more innovative projects like those at DCTV–to help filmmakers in New York to make their films, have the freedom to create their visions and to have audiences find their work. Undoubtedly, other groups have their own unannounced plans, but I would propose that to really keep New York as the independent film capital, we need a lot more dreaming, and soon.

Be Sociable, Share!

• 
•