| March
24, Thursday, 7:30PM, 2005
Filmmakers on Tour: Jim Finn (in
person)
& Arthur Jones
(in
person)
Jim
Finn
will be screening his new video series
La Lotería as well as old favorites
like his "gerbil biopic wüstenspringmaus".
Arthur Jones is touring with
his newest animated series Monster Team, about
a fraternity of dysfunctional suburban beasts
living in an Enron-style corporate office park.
Jim
Finn (b. 1968, St. Louis) lives in
Chicago and makes videos about small animals,
love and communism. His house is a kind of
MGM lot for experimental animal videos. His
work has screened at the Rotterdam International
Film Festival, New York Underground Film Festival,
Cinematexas, and the Yerba Buena Center for
the Arts. His work has also appeared on the
PBS and in Harper’s magazine. He is
currently touring with his newest video series
La Lotería. He is also working on a
series of needlepoint portraits of South American
communist heroes and touring red state craft
fairs with them.
Arthur Jones (b. 1974) is
an animator and illustrator who studied at
the Rhode Island School of Design. His animated
shorts are fast-paced, meticulously detailed,
creepy and cute. They have shown in the Chicago
Underground Film Festival, Worm Film Series
(Rotterdam), Chicago International Children's
Film Festival, LA Shorts, and Gavin Brown
Passerby Gallery in New York. His design work
includes promotional paint-by-number kits
for the public radio program This American
Life, advertising for Thrill Jockey Records,
and art direction for Dirty Found magazine.
His online sketchbook, www.gorillasuit.com,
receives thousands of hits a week and has
been viewed by nerds the world over.
About
Jim Finn's Program:
La Lotería (video series, Jim Finn, 2004-5)
La Lotería is a series of single-channel
videos with a music track based on the Mexican
card game. Lotería is Spanish for lottery,
which the Oxford English Dictionary describes
as "that which comes to a person by lot
or chance." The videos use cultural references
like love songs, sports, animals, revolutionary
ballads, and political iconography like someone
lifting a wet log to see what's underneath.
Though each of them can stand alone, as a series
they work to strengthen each other by reinforcing
certain themes, songs and editing decisions.
el
valiente is a collection of the 70s
Bond girls who never knew loneliness "until
I met you" (from la lotería 3:45
min)
la calavera (from la lotería 3 min)
"The repetitive missile from a war plane
blurs into a war game. Add an uplifting song
to it and you have a perfectly entertaining
video game. Or is it reality? -L.A. Freewaves
El
moro (from la lotería 2:30
min) "Deep down, we have always suspected
there must be some connection between J.R.R.
Tolkien, Star Trek, and the rise of the radical
Left. Leave it to Jim Finn to bring it all
together." -New York Underground Film
Festival
El
corazón is about a mustached
man who loves his team and his girl (from la
lotería 3:15 min)
la bandera (from la lotería 2 min, 2005)
A flag-waving dolphin trainer changes a Mexican
love song to a love-it-or-leave-it ultimatum.
wüstenspringmaus
(3 min, 2002) "Jim Finn's Wüstenspringmaus,
a well-sprung, rear-screened account of a
gerbil's life in the Seventies." –
Guy Maddin, Film Comment
El paraguas (from
la lotería 3:45 min) Donald Rumsfeld
and Saddam Hussein met in 1985: "Oh the
wind and the rain."
la palmera
(from la lotería 1:45 min) A love letter
from a Florida car wash.
El catrín (from
la lotería, 2:10) A Southern tuxedo
wedding becomes a meditation on despair.
El azteca
(from la lotería, 3 min) Ricardo Montablan's
Khan in the 60s and the 80s is still fighting
the good fight: "It's not enough to pray!"
El pájaro (from
the series la lotería 2 min). A red-state
playoff game is the excuse for a world uprising.
la corona
(from la lotería, 1:30 min) The Bush
inner circle at Crawford moving to the sounds
of the Mexican Frank Sinatra.
la cobra
(from la lotería 2:30 min). A love
song about a drowned girl is illustrated in
a bath and tanning booth.
 |
the golden horde (4:30
min, 16mm on video, 2004) An educational animal
film about control and a broken heart: "Tomorrow,
we begin again!"
El payaso
stars the gerbil francoise in his habitrail
gridiron (from la lotería 3:45 min)
la estrella
(from la lotería, 2:30 min). Cosmonaut
stamps and communist icons turn a Frank and
Nancy Sinatra song into another Internationale.
la rosa (from
la lotería 3 min). A cautionary tale
of an emperor from a great state who takes
whatever he wants.
la
ardilla (from la lotería 2 min)
"Jim Finn woos his charming, bright-eyed
neighbor, who hesitatingly returns his affections.
A pure romantic comedy, one that is tender,
brave, and genuinely funny." -Cinematexas
About
Arthur Jones's Program:
Arthur's program consists of two parts. The
first portion is made up of two powerpoint presentations
presented live by the artist. The second portion
is two animated cartoons, the first being a
music video for Philadelphia band Need
New Body and the second is a 17 minute
piece named the Monster Team.
900
lb. Gorilla
(approx. 7 min.) A short story about a newspaper
missed connection ad lining the bottom of
a gorilla's cage.
The
Abominable Snowman (approx. 6 min.)
The North Pole's most mysterious citizen experiences
a mid life crisis and fantasizes about the
destruction of earth.
Beach
(2 min) A music video for the Philadelphia
band Need New Body, off of their record UFO.
A trip to the Beach that is one part methamphetamine
and one part sun tan lotion.
Monster
Team (17 min.) Wolfman, Phantom of
the Opera, Caveman, Creature of the Black
Lagoon, and Mummy are the Monster Team, a
clueless fraternity of creatures that live
in a clubhouse that looks suspiciously like
the Enron headquarters.
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