The inaugural screenings for THE ARTISTS FORUM FESTIVAL OF THE MOVING IMAGE featured 23 international short films created by independent filmmakers originating from 8 countries: France, Germany, Greece, Iran, Taiwan, Turkey, United Kingdom, and the United States. The festival selections covered a wide array of disciplines: narrative, experimental, documentary, animation, and music video works. Additional festival highlights include an opening night filmmakers’ reception, an awards ceremony, and our closing night party.
This two day event was held July 6th and 7th, 2016 from 7PM to 10:30PM each night at Nancy Manocherian’s The Cell Theatre in New York City’s Chelsea District. You can find the 2016 program, nominees, and winners below.
Two panels were presented live to tape at MNN Studios: AFTV Ep. 71: Efficacy and the Media Maker featuring panelists Jonathan Ullman, Richard Speziale, and DaShawn Pretlow with host Devorah Hill, and AFTV #72: The Elements of Style – Making Music Videos on a Budget featuring panelists Aaron Cobbett and Mike Lowther with host Bill Coleman (Peace Bisquit).
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2016 FILM FESTIVAL PROGRAM SCHEDULE
DAY 1: JULY 6
7PM: DARK THEMES (55 MINS)
EMPTY ROOMS
18:00 min (2015)
Writer/Director: Kristen Mae Carbone (US)
NARRATIVE – A naive young woman is forced to reckon with the mess her life has become.
HADES
14:59 min (2014)
Writer/Director: Kevin Kopacka (Germany)
EXPERIMENTAL/NARRATIVE – A woman is caught in an endless dream in which she has to cross the five rivers of Hades, in order to regain her memory.
PET
11:21 min (2015)
Writer/Director: Christos Liakouris (Greece)
NARRATIVE – Dimitris (a 10 years old boy) is the only child of a rich family. The only person that took care of him, his grandma, is dead. Now his only companion is his pet guinea pig.
CAT KILLER
09:48 min (2015)
Writer/Director: Jeff Dorer (US)
EXPERIMENTAL – An exterminator clearing an abandoned building of feral cats takes his job personally, in this nightmarish animated fable.
8:10PM: EXPERIMENTAL SHORTS (50 MINS)
TRIBUTE TO BUSBY
06:00 min (2014)
Writer/Director: Eytan Ipeker (Turkey)
EXPERIMENTAL – (A silent film) A kaleidoscopic homage to the great film choreographer and director.
SEE TRAILER / SEE WEBSITE
THE COMMITTEE TO DECIDE THINGS
03:30 min (2015)
Writer/Director: Christopher Loar (US)
EXPERIMENTAL/COMEDY – The Perfection 1200 is a 14+ year old scanner. As its arm moves, light bounces off of the subject and returns. Don Boros’s double speaks about Beckett – “living truthfully, under imaginary circumstances.”When a mysterious focus group can’t seem to make a decision, who will be held responsible?
PERFORMANCE FOR PROJECTION 1200
13:26 min (2014)
Writer/Director: Ariana Gerstein (US)
EXPERIMENTAL – The Perfection 1200 is a 14+ year old scanner. As its arm moves, light bounces off of the subject and returns. Don Boros’s double speaks about Beckett – “living truthfully, under imaginary circumstances.”
VOICES FROM KAW THOO LEI
10:45 min (2016)
Writer/Director: Martha Gorzycki (US)
DOCUMENTARY – Karen people from Burma speak about surviving terrorism and genocide inflicted by the Burmese military government. Over 10,000 photos animate a sentient landscape over which Voices from Kaw Thoo Lei may be heard.
TRANSITUS SIDERUM
11:24 min (2014)
Writer/Dir: Stewart Collinson/Andrea Szigetvári (UK)
EXPERIMENTAL – Painted 16mm film: minimal/visual/sonic palette of looped, composited, processed field recordings. Explores spaces between sensory experience and percept, simplicity and complexity.
INTERFACE
02:28 min (2015)
Writer/Director: Mel Hsieh (Taiwan)
EXPERIMENTAL –Digital media is like a transparent thin layer of skin; it shields our notion of self, and also the ability to transform and change. “Interface” is an experimental film about a self-portrait made of assemblages and investigates co-existing multiple digital identities. “The best interface is no interface”
OPENING NIGHT PARTY
DAY 2: JULY 7
7PM: DRAMATIC NARRATIVES (1HR 40 MINS)
GUAO
34:24 min (2015)
Writer/Director: Eduardo Velazquez (US)
NARRATIVE – Set in Buenos Aires, “Guao” is the story of Luperon; a naïve, Caribbean immigrant with a profound love for Catherine Deneuve. He suffers from a degenerative brain disease and is protected by his sister Ana. He decides to gender transition, become Deneuve, and fall for a religious fanatic.
SPLIT END
05:40 min (2014)
Writer/Director: Eddie Shieh (US)
NARRATIVE – A young, single woman bored with her social life and trapped in the hustle of city living, caters a party for a beautiful couple and Tinds the charismatic husband also looking for something new.
FORTRESS
14:04 min (2016)
Writer: Anna Ziegler (US) / Director: Amir Arison (US)
NARRATIVE – April, a soft spoken American, and Kalev, an over-confident Israeli, meet at an Italian restaurant after connecting online and agreeing to go on their first date. This heartfelt comedy is an adaptation of Anna Ziegler’s one-act play, “A Map of Broken Glass.”
FISH
03:50 min (2016)
Writer/Director: Saman Hosseinpuor (Iran)
NARRATIVE – An old couple lives in an apartment. The lady wants to change the fishbowl’s water, but it slips out of her hand and falls on the ground. Unfortunately, they’ve run out of water for the fish. What to do?
1 – 0
01:00 min (2015)
Writer/Director: Saman Hosseinpuor (Iran)
NARRATIVE – A boy is watching a soccer game on TV and gets so excited he forgets he’s in the middle of a haircut. Oops!
AUTUMN LEAVES
03:59 min (2015)
Writer/Director: Saman Hosseinpuor (Iran)
NARRATIVE – A girl’s walk to school gets interrupted, with ironic results.
THE FIRST SMILE AFTER
01:40 min (2015)
Writer/Director: Zahra Jafari (Iran)
NARRATIVE – By their innocent world, children save us from our sad miserable world and this film has a quick look at a love message that is the savior.
TOUCH OF RAIN
02:20 min (2015)
Writer/Director: Zahra Jafari (Iran)
NARRATIVE – Rain is a pleasant murmur for beauties of nature. With a childlike view, this film tries to show that there is always hope for raining and even it is our own mind that presents rain to us in a dry.
SEE TRAILER / SEE WEBSITE
UNCONSCIOUSNESS WITH OPEN EYES
04:36 min (2015)
Writer/Director: Zahra Jafari (Iran)
NARRATIVE – Modern diseases not only harm the patient but also cause an extreme disturbance to the family and the consequences are debatable. What could be done in such situation? How people who are involved, react to it? This film has a quick look at a day of the life of an Alzheimer’s patient.
OMESSA
19:20 min (2015)
Writer: Laetitia Martinucci & Charlène Favier (France)
Director: Charlène Favier (France)
NARRATIVE – Anna never leaves her backpack and doesn’t come back to France often. Discovering a lump in her breast, she goes to a gynecologist who tells her that it is worrying. For Anna, it’s the moment to return in Corsica to face her history and her father.
PROMISE ME
08:02 min (2015)
Writer/Director: Kevin Machate (US)
NARRATIVE – Promise Me is an emotionally charged social drama in which a once
flourishing woman, now at the end of her life, struggles to ensure that her recently reconciled son does not make the same mistakes that she did.
9PM: MUSIC VIDEOS
LOW
04:17 min (2015)
Writer/Director: Mike Lowther (US)
MUSIC VIDEO – The music video for One Hundred Thousand’s “Low” presents a world where the imaginary is believable, and the interpretation of losing yourself is that much more real.
CHA CHA BITCH
03:50 min (2015)
Writer/Director: Aaron Cobbett (US)
Songwriter/Performer: AB Soto (US)
MUSIC VIDEO – English/Spanish dance music video. Concept: He has so many costume changes he ends up in outer space.
AWARDS CEREMONY & CLOSING NIGHT PARTY
JUDGES
Devorah E. Hill
Devorah is a multimedia artist and media educator whose taught countless producers the fine art of non-linear editing for television in NYC. Additionally, Devorah has been served as a juror for many metro area film festivals who focus on providing platforms for the emerging filmmaker.
Cyrille Phipps
Cyrille is a NYC-based media literacy educator, adjunct professor, and filmmaker. She earned her BFA in Film Drama from Syracuse U and MA in Media Studies from The New School. She’s freelanced as a camera and/or editor for Interactive One, HITN, and Sesame Workshop.
Da’Shawn Pretlow
Da’Shawn is the Media Education Coordinator at Manhattan Neighborhood Network (MNN) – a public access TV station based in New York City. Additionally, Da’Shawn consults independent media producers and hosts well attended webinars on topics surrounding TV production.
Richard Speziale
Rich is an award-winning producer, broadcaster, and director. A former network news editor, he’s known for directing the long-running, nationally-distributed news program Gay USA since 2003. Rich wrote and edited the 2009 award-winning documentary Burma: An Indictment.
Jonathan Ullman
Jonathan is a NYC-based independent filmmaker. He wrote, directed, and produced his debut feature Trouble In The Heights (Viva Pictures), garnering two Imagen Award noms for Best Picture and Best Actor. His film on Paradise Garage and DJ Larry Levan is in development.
Amos White V
Amos is an inter-disciplinary multimedia artist, event producer, and exhibit designer. A graduate of the College of Human Ecology at the University of Maryland, College Park, Amos bridges his passion for the arts and human relations with the formation of THE ARTISTS FORUM
AWARD LISTINGS
View our full List of Nominees & Award Winners
2016 WINNERS
BEST NARRATIVE SHORT: Omessa (Laetitia Martinucci & Charlene Favier, France)
BEST EXPERIMENTAL SHORT: The Committee To Decide Things (Christopher Loar, US)
BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT: Voices From Kaw Thoo Lei (Martha Gorzycki, US)
BEST NY NARRATIVE SHORT: Empty Rooms (Kristen Mae Carbone, US)
BEST ANIMATED SHORT: Cat Killer (Jeff Dorer, US)
BEST MUSIC VIDEO: Cha Cha Bitch (Aaron Cobbett, US)
BEST SOUND DESIGN: Mel Hsieh – Interface (Mel Hsieh, US)
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY: Yann Maritaud – Omessa (Martinucci/Favier, France)
BEST DIRECTOR: Charlene Favier – Omessa (Martinucci/Favier, France)
BEST EDITING: Eddie Shieh – Split End (Eddie Shieh, US)
BEST SCREENPLAY: Laetitia Martinucci & Charlene Favier – Omessa (Martinucci/Favier, FR)
BEST ACTOR: Amir Arison – Fortress (Amir Arison, US)
BEST ACTRESS: Laetitia Martinucci – Omessa (Martinucci/Favier, France)
2016 AUDIENCE AWARD: Guao (Eduardo Velazquez, Dominican Republic/US)
2016 JURORS AWARD: Christopher Loar – The Committee To Decide Things (C. Loar, US)
MEDIA HIGHLIGHTS
View or download our 2016 Festival Program
View our 2016 Festival Photo Highlights
View or download our 2016 Official Festival Flyer
View or download our 2016 Festival PDF Postcard
Watch our 2016 MEET the Filmmakers Interview Videos
