PXL THIS 11 (2001)

PXL THIS 11
Check the schedule below for the PXL THIS ELEVEN tour. The 12th annual festival featuring videos made with the PXL-2000 toy camera will premiere on November 9, 2002 at 7:00 and 9:00pm (two different shows) at Midnight Special Bookstore (1318 Third Street Promenade, Santa Monica, CA 90401. 310-393-2923, http://www.msbooks.com). Free Admission.

The Santa Monica video store, Vidiots (302 Pico Blvd., Santa Monica, CA, 310-392-8508) exclusively rents various PXL THIS compilations.This unique festival features videos made with a plastic video camcorder (manufactured 1987 -1989) that records sound and images directly onto audiocassettes.

PXL THIS ELEVEN
Vidiots (Los Angeles, 310-392-8508), 2/22/2002 and Other Cinema.com (San Francisco) 4/20/2002 - Films marked below with an (*) are part of the tour:

FINAL EXIT - Joe Gibbons, 5 min
* RITT HENN'S GOIN' BACK - Dave Edison, 5min
* DODGE ALLEY - Duncan MacLeod, 15min
* HOMO SAPIEN - Bryan Konefsky, 3min
* RESERVATIONS - Ann Randolph, 4m
* SPOT - Doug Ing, 8min
* WHERE WERE YOU WHEN THE BUBBLE BURST? - Michael Possert, 3min
CHINA DOLL - Eugene Gonzales, 3min
* ATTENTION - Gerry Fialka, 3min
* FAULT - Gerald Slota & Stephen Roman, 5min
* GLINK - Sean Eno, 8min
* KI KU - Denny Moynahan, 5min
* WRITTEN SPOKEN SUNG - Michael O'Reilly, 11min
PIXYLIGHTING - Paul Bacca, 5m
JEFF - Mark Heunar, 4min
MAGICAL CAT - Joanne Wallace, 11min


9:00pm
* THE PREPLAY OF BOB & WALTER - Gerry Fialka, 11min
* YOUR ARE THE EIFFEL TOWER OF MY LOVE, BABY - Betsy Kalin, 5min
* CLOSE COPIES - Ellen Lake, 3min
* ZAP YER ASS - Eli Elliott, 9min
FAUSTUS - Rose Hansen, 2min excerpt of 20min
PHILOSOPHER'S UNION MEMBER'S MOUTHPIECE - Litninov, 6min
YOU TALK, I BUY - ERic Saks, 9min
* BEING BEEFHEART - Richard Van Tank, 6min
STARTLED INTO LIFE, LIKE FIRE - Elric Kane, 8min
THE FUNERAL SOUNG - Malcom Dalglish, 4min
BIRD CAGE WEDDING CAKE - Carolyn Coolie & Rachel Mayeri, 15min
* AIDS YET - Mark Hejnar, 1min
ON A SUMMER'S DAY - Mark Hejnar, 2min
THE LONELY - Bruno Derlin & Mark DOyle, 19min

COTG is always accepting entries for future PXL THIS festivals (see Submissions below). MUCHO THANKS to everyone who helps.

EVENT CALENDAR
November 9, 2002 - PXL THIS 12 (Midnight Special)

SUBMISSIONS
COTG is now accepting entries for PXL THIS. For more information, please send a self-addressed stamped envelope or call Gerry Fialka, 2427 1/2 Glyndon Ave, Venice, CA 90291, #310-306-7330. The rules for entry are the same every year. Submissions must be shot with the PXL 2000 camera (but not exclusively), and entered on VHS videotape at SP (2 hour) speed. Do not send originals; no returns. All categories accepted, Deadline for entry is always Sept 22. Mail to: PXL, 2427 1/2 Glyndon Ave., Venice, CA 90291, 310-306-7330. Please include a synopsis and THREE 34-cent stamps with each entry.

Hey! you can send email now...just use c1964@pacbell.net. Continue to feel free to write or call.

ARCHIVE OF PREVIOUS PXL THIS EVENTS

PXL THIS 10



RELATED LINKS

http://elvis.rowan.edu/~cassidy/pixel/ for more about the PXL 2000

http://jesgrew.org/wake for the Marshall McLuhan/Finnegans Wake Reading Club, moderated by Gerry Fialka

Pixel Pix Picks article on othercinema.com - a review of PXL This 10 by Peggy Nelson

go.to/pxlmods - the only place on the planet where you can get your Fisher Price PXL 2000 camera modified for video and audio out for a premium price, guaranteed!



THE HISTORY OF PXL THIS

PXL THIS is the name of a festival that features videos produced using the PXL 2000, a toy camera. This unique plastic video camcorder records sound and images directly onto audiocassettes. The PXL 2000 was available from 1987 to 1989 from the toy company, Fisher-Price. James Wickstead Design Associates, inventors of the technology, plan to have a new and improved version back in the stores soon. The picture is comprised of 2,000 "pixels" as opposed to the 150,000 pixels seen on the average TV screen, which makes for a very grainy but appealing quality. Filmmaker Spike Stewart is enthralled with this black and white dot matrix picture (Pixelvision) and says, "There's sort of a nouveau-Gothic image you'd see in a movie from the twenties or thirties, which you don't see anymore." Another amazing feature is its "in-focus" capability form zero to infinity. Designed to be the "lightest, least expensive (under $100) and easiest to use camcorder on the market," it empowered independent artists while the 10 to 16-year-old targeted consumers probably rejected it. PXL THIS organizer Gerry Fialka says, "PXL is the essential utensil of creation. The really creative artist does a lot with nothing. PXL THIS is based on the statements, 'It is literally possible to do more with less' -Buckminster Fuller and 'Film will only become art when its materials are as inexpensive as pencil and paper' -Jean Cocteau. It's a real pencil and paper mentality. Express yourself, and don't be afraid to break some rules. Like Cocteau said, "What one should do with the young is to give them a portable camera and forbid them to observe any rules except those they invent for themselves as they go along. Let them write without being afraid of making mistakes.' But PXL THIS is for all ages." Dave Edison, who created the music video MAINTENANCE specifically for submission to PXL THIS THREE, says, "Artists can always create, but chances to exhibit our work are often hard to find. As a videomaker and PXL 2000 owner, I regard the PXL THIS festival as a unique, exciting and irresistible opportunity. "Poet Laurent Fels proclaims, "PXL THIS is a genius idea. I always love art expressing itself with cheap means because its low price enables you to be totally free to express yourself without being threatened by producers whose high costs 'oblige' you to make something commercial." Writer Erika Suderberg called the PXL 2000 " a magic toy that restores a certain human vitality to the overpowering technology of video" in the magazine INTERNATIONAL DOCUMENTARY, winter 1991. In PREMIERE magazine April 1993, J. Hoberman wrote, "The ultimate example of cinematic pencil and paper is surely the Fisher-Price Pixelvision video camera...the ultimate in people's video.

Clap Off They Glass Productions was started by Gerry Fialka in 1991 to support independent video-makers by sponsoring the annual PXL THIS festival, which is the oldest of its kind in the world. There are two public screenings in Los Angeles per festival; the premiere being in November, the second in February. PXL THIS TEN will screen in November 2000 and in February 2001. The two hour plus program features entries from across North America spanning many genres including documentary, poetry, experimental, drama, comedy and music. PXL THIS plays to packed houses every year.

Mary Beth Crain wrote in the LA WEEKLY, "The power of PXL is somehow indisputable. The medium becomes a means of alchemically altering the most mundane realities. Blurred, off-kilter black-and-white images transcend mere out-of-focus mediocrity to become captivatingly surreal. Body parts (eyes and mouths are favorites with beginning PXL artists) acquire personalities of their own. Virtually every selection on the PXL THIS program evidences an undeniable charm and talent." Jean Cocteu said, "It is vital that the camera become a pen and that everyone should be able to express themselves through this visual medium."