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18TH ANNUAL CHICAGO UNDERGROUND FILM FESTIVAL PRESENTS: EVEN STILL 2: THE RETURNING,  An Exhibit of CUFF Alumni & Friends

Posted Wednesday, May 25th, 2011 - Comments Off on 18TH ANNUAL CHICAGO UNDERGROUND FILM FESTIVAL PRESENTS: EVEN STILL 2: THE RETURNING,  An Exhibit of CUFF Alumni & Friends
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For Immediate Release
Gene Siskel Film Center Gallery, May 26th – June 30, 2011
Opening Reception, June 2nd, 6pm-8pm  –  Open to the Public

(May 18, 2011) –   Just like your typical horror movie, the CUFF Exhibition of non-moving image works by Alumni and Friends has returned with essentially the same plot, but a whole new cast of characters.   This exhibition features drawings, photographs, and mixed media works by Steve Reinke, Ben Rivers, Cynthia Plaster Caster, Mike Olenick, Thomas Comerford, Erin Page, Tony Balko, Jodie Mack and Mike Lopez.

2011 is CUFF’s 18th year of sharing important, bizarre, transgressive, sublime and profound moving images.  To compliment this year’s programming, we bring you the sequel to last year’s inaugural gallery exhibition.  Even Still 2: The Returning is a collection of the most striking wall-hanging, two-dimensional and stationary work of some of CUFF’s favorite filmmakers, animators, video artists, poster artists, AND groupies.  The work in this show is cinematic and playful, aware of its attention to (or obsession with) genre and pop culture.  Much of the content is referential or borrowed, cleverly altering context to confuse what was seen with what’s imagined and remembered.

For this exhibit, we’re going to strike the projectors and ask you to get out of your seat to see what these artists create in moments of “pause”.

Featured work:

A poster wall by 2011 CUFF poster artist: Erin Page – Kill Hatsumomo Prints (www.killhatsumomoprints.com)

A Photograph from the world of Slow Action by Ben Rivers, London, England (www.benrivers.com)

Rivers’s film SLOW ACTION screens Sunday, June 5th, 6pm

Fan Drawings by Cynthia Plaster Caster, Chicago, IL (www.cynthiaplastercaster.com)

In 2010-11, Cynthia ran for Mayor of Chicago on the Hard Party ticket. CUFF voted for her.

A Re-contextualized Photo Series by Mike Olenick, Columbus, OH

(www.mikeolenick.com)

Olenick’s video SPACEBOY screens Saturday, June 4th, 5:15pm/Tuesday, June 7th, 6pm

Haunting Prints of stills from VHS by Tony Balko, Milwaukee, WI

Balko’s video MOBY DICK screens Sunday, June 5th, 8pm

Felt/Fabric work by Mike Lopez, Chicago, IL (www.wix.com/marblestone/deemarble)

Lopez stars in SOME GIRLS NEVER LEARN, Thursday, June 2nd, 8pm

Altered comic strips by Steve Reinke, Chicago, IL (www.myrectumisnotagrave.com)   Reinke’s animation (with Jessie Mott) BLOOD & CINNAMON screens Saturday, June 4th, 4pm

A Multi-media installation by Thomas Comerford, Chicago, IL (thomascomerford.net)

Thomas Comerford will be playing original music at the Friday night party at Quencher’s Saloon

Collage replicas of cinematic testframes by Jodie Mack, Hanover, NH (jodiemack.com)

Mack’s animation UNSCUBSCRIBE #3 (GLITCH ENVY) screens Saturday, June 4th, 4pm

Last year was the first year CUFF took over the Siskel Café/Gallery with an impressive array of works by James Fotopoulos, Deborah Stratman, Lilli Carré, Ross Nugent, Lisa Barcy, Ray Pride, Alexander Stewart, Jon.Satrom, Robert Todd and Michael Robinson (http://cuff.org/exhibitions/).

Tickets and Locations

Tickets for the 18th Chicago Underground Film Festival will go on sale June 1 and are priced at $10 for general admission; a $5 discount is available for all Gene Siskel Film Center and IFP/ Chicago Members. Tickets are available through Ticketmaster at (800) 982-2787 and www.ticketmaster.com or at the Gene Siskel Film Center box office.  All film screenings are held at the Gene Siskel Film Center located at 164 North State Street.

About CUFF

Since 1994, the Chicago Underground Film Festival has presented the finest in new underground, experimental and documentary film and video. In 2008 the festival entered into a partnership with IFP/Chicago and in 2009 the festival moved to the state of the art Gene Siskel Film Center.  Our mission is to promote films and videos that dissent radically in form, technique, or content from the ‘indie’ mainstream and to present adventurous works that challenge and transcend commercial and audience expectations.

Programming highlights in years past have included premieres of Scrappers, American Radical: The Trials of Norman Finkelstein, It Came From Kuchar!, Nice Bombs, Danielson: A Family Movie, Oscar-nominated documentary The Weather Underground, Monks – The Transatlantic Feedback, Blood Car, and more.  Additionally, numerous CUFF films have gone on to receive theatrical distribution.

About IFP/Chicago

IFP/Chicago is a non-profit organization committed to the idea that independent film is an important art form and a powerful voice in our society. We provide resources, information and avenues of communication for independent filmmakers, industry professionals and independent film enthusiasts. We encourage quality and diversity in independent production and assist filmmakers at all levels of experience in realizing their unique vision.

About the Gene Siskel Film Center, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago

The Gene Siskel Film Center of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago celebrates 39 years of presenting cutting edge programs, independent and international cinema, premieres, retrospectives, and classic films. Internationally recognized for its original film programming, the Film Center is a vibrant cultural destination in Chicago that attracts a diverse and creative annual audience of over 81,000.

A leader in educating artists and designers for 144 years, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago offers undergraduate and graduate programs to nearly 2,800 students from around the world. In addition to the time-honored study of painting, sculpture, printmaking, and design, SAIC’s studio programs embrace film and new media, electronic and sound arts, and creative writing. To complement its studio programs, SAIC offers academic degrees in disciplines from art history to arts administration, visual and critical studies to historic preservation. Located in the heart of Chicago, the School promotes contemporary discourse about art and design through venues such as the Gene Siskel Film Center, Video Data Bank, Betty Rymer Gallery, Gallery 2, the Division of Studies, and in conjunction with the Poetry Center.

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It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?

So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.

And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.

There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.

I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.

So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.

But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”

My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher

“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.

~ David Simon