March 27th, Thursday, 5:30PM

Balagan Film Series Presents:
Selection of Shorts from the Black Maria Film Festival (2007)
Director of Black Maria Festival, John Columbus, in attendance
& Local Filmmaker Robert Todd also in attendance

logo Museum of Fine Arts
465 Huntington Avenue Boston, Massachusetts 02115
Tickets: $8 general admission


Festival Description:

Since 1981, the annual Black Maria Film and Video Festival, an international juried competition and award tour, has been fulfilling its mission to advocate, exhibit and reward cutting edge works from independent film and videomakers. The festival is known for its national public exhibition program, which featuresa variety of bold contemporary works drawn from the annual collection of 50 award winning films and videos.

Following a rigorous jurying process, the festival launches its national tour each January. Over 70 institutions welcome the Black Maria Festival, and each individual program is custom tailored, ensuring an accessible and meaningful experience for varied audiences at theaters, museums, colleges, libraries, film societies, microcinemas, and community organizations from coast to coast.

Today the works exhibited by the Black Maria Film and Video Festival explore the human condition as well as the creative potential of the medium. They offer a mosaic of artistically conceived film and video forms (documentary, experimental, animation and narrative) but with an emphasis on cutting edge sensibility. The Festival Tour exhibits the winning works in various thematic and artistic configurations tailored to diverse audiences at venues which are conducive to the genuine appreciation of the work.

Individual programs vary in length (although most are approximately 90 minutes) and are curated from the award winnersby experienced festival programmers in conjunction with representatives from the host institution. A festival curator travels to each venue to introduce and oversee the exhibition of the work and to facilitate audience discussion. Program booklets with descriptions of all theworks available in the annual collection are provided toeach audience member.

In addition to these programs, The Black Maria Film and Video Festival has recently begun a special collaboration with the Robert Flaherty Film Seminar. Works which have been showcased in the seminar are considered for exhibition in the Black Maria and if accepted, are highlighted and arranged in special presentations.