festivals Archives - Page 3 of 14

I’m outta here

I’ll be in Europe until October 17 (on which date I will be speaking at MoMA!) so I may be virtually non-existent online. Or not, depending on how many free wireless connections are available and how well my netbook holds up.

Again, I’m gonna be in:

France:
September 25 – Nancy – A l’Ã¨re Libre Festival de la culture Libre
September 26 – Pessac, near Bordeaux – Journée des Cultures Libres
Armenia:
October 3-6 – Yerevan – ReAnimania Animation Festival
London:
Oct. 14-16 – Power to the Pixel Conference

Have fun while I’m away! Don’t burn the house down!

Sita comes “home”

Sita Sings the Blues is going to screen in Trivandrum, Kerala, at the 2nd International Documentary and Short Film Festival of Kerala.

Kairali Theatre on 20/06/09 at 6.15 pm

I couldn’t find an official web site, but there’s a blog about the festival here.

I was living in Trivandrum when I read my first Ramayana, and started drawing characters from it, which eventually became Sita Sings the Blues. I won’t be attending this festival, but I’m thrilled Sita will.

Back from Nerd Central

And crazy busy. Chicago and Urbana and Ebertfest were great, amazing, beyond my ability to emotionally comprehend, I’ve never had a week like that before. Then to top it off, Sita won Best Narrative Feature at the Indian Film festival of Los Angeles, and moved to #1 on Critical Consensus. That’s just nuts.

Anyway, it was great being back in Urbana, my hometown, where nerds are made as well as born. I was raised nerd, by nerds, and it’s only a fluke that I appear to be an artist; my heart belongs to nerd-dom. Want proof? Here I am visiting family friend, genius, and art-supporter Theo Gray at Wolfram Research:
My Free Culture activism is nerdy too, inspired as it is by the Free Software movement. Theo doesn’t like it, and made fiercely pro-copyright arguments as only a proprietary software nerd can.

For contrast, here’s a picture of me with Richard Stallman in New York:

Whose side am I on, anyway? The side of NERDS!

Back to Illinois

I left my hometown of Urbana, IL, almost 21 years ago, with dreams of becoming a new age crystal-wielding hippie. I was 20 years old. Now I’m 40 (almost 41!) and will be returning with a feature film, for a film festival that didn’t exist when I was growing up. But first: the University of Chicago!

Who’da thunk back in 1988, that I’d be blogging about this in 2009? We couldn’t even imagine blogs back then.

Duke University tonight – January 26

M Jan 26 Griffith ( 6pm-6:45pm) | Special Events — prelude to the 7pm screening!
‘Face to Face’ — A public dialogue about copyright, public domain, and filmmaking with public domain expert Jennifer Jenkins and independent filmmaker Nina Paley

M Jan 26 Griffith ( 7pm ) | FVD Showcase (screening & discussion)
Sita Sings the Blues
(Nina Paley, 2008, 82 min, USA , in English, Color, 35mm)
â€“ followed by a discussion/Q&A with director Nina Paley + Prof. Srinivas Aravamudan (Dept. of English)!

My Chanukah Miracle

So there I was at the Dubai International Film Festival last week, and I forgot to bring my mobile phone charger. Usually my Blackberry’s battery conks out after less than 2 days, whether I make calls or not. But lo! That single charge lasted through the entire festival, and even worked when I got back to New York! 6 days of battery use on one charge. Blessed art Thou O Lord Our goD, King of the Universe! Happy Chanukah!