PXL THIS

PXL THIS 20 (2011)

2011-02-14T10:13:00.000-08:00

PXL THIS 20, the 20th annual toy camera film festival featuring Pixelvision films made with the Fisher-Price PXL-2000 camcorder.

Wouldn't this make a great story?

PXL THIS 20, the 20th annual toy camera film festival featuring Pixelvision films made with the Fisher-Price PXL-2000 camcorder, screens May 19, 2011 in Los Angeles, California. PXL THIS, the second oldest film festival in LA, celebrates visionary moving image artists from 4-years-olds to professionals.

for immediate release
contact: Gerry Fialka 310-306-7330
pfsuzy@aol.com Visit: http://pxl2000.blogspot.com/ and http://sites.google.com/site/pxlthis/ and http://www.laughtears.com/ and http://www.youtube.com/user/pxlthis

PXL THIS 20, the 20th annual toy camera film festival,
screens Thursday, May 19, 2011, 8pm at Echo Park Film Center, 1200 N Alvarado St. (at Sunset Blvd.) Los Angeles, CA, 90026, 213-484-8846, admission $5, http://www.echoparkfilmcenter.org/ (where one can actually rent a PXL 2000 camcorder & past PXL THIS dvds). More PXL THIS info: 310-306-7330 http://www.laughtears.com/
Preshow features a sneak preview of Wickstead's Wonder - an interview with James Wickstead, the inventor of the Fisher Price PXL 2000 camcorder. Wickstead jwda@wicksteaddesign.com is available for interviews. Scroll down to read a recent article on him.

PXL THIS 20 press:
http://santamonica.patch.com/articles/toy-camcorder-fest-focuses-on-wild-imaginations
http://www.kcet.org/socal/voices/blur-sharpen/if-it-works-its-obsolete.html
http://www.examiner.com/santa-monica-city-buzz-in-los-angeles/introducing-gerry-fialka-s-pxl-this-20
PXL THIS celebrates its 20th year of creativity by everyone from kids to professionals. One of the most unique film festivals ever, PXL THIS has been attended by Oliver Stone, Daryl Hannah, Kim Fowley among many more. Pixelvision has even made it onto the big screen via Richard Linklater (Slacker), Michael Almereyda (Nadja, produced by David Lynch) and Craig Baldwin (Sonic Outlaws). The irresistible irony of the PXL 2000 is that the camera's ease-of-use and affordability, which entirely democratizes movie-making, has inspired the creation of some of the most visionary, avant and luminous film of our time. "If movies offer an escape from everyday life, Pixelvision is the Houdini of the film world."
- SF Weekly

PXL THIS, featuring films made with the Fisher-Price PXL 2000 toy camcorder, is one of the longest running film festivals in the entertainment capital of the world. Celebrating "cinema povera" moving image art, it evokes Marcel Duchamp's axiom "Poor tools require better skills." Pixelators from across the globe hoick up inventive approaches to the unassuming throw-away of consumer culture. These low-tech hi-jinx films come through loud and clear by reframing a new cinema language.  Past PXL THIS participants have included Lee Ranaldo (Sonic Youth), Chris Metzler (Fishbone & Salton Sea documentaries), James & Sadie Benning, Joe Gibbons, Cecilia Dougherty, Peggy Ahwesh, Jesse Drew, Margie Strosser and Michael Almereyda.
"Gerry Fialka’s annual PXL THIS is a reliably surprising and seductive round-up of recent work achieved with the PXL 2000 camera. This humble outdated “toy” continues to bring out the visionary child in filmmakers and viewers alike, and no one has kept the PXL flame burning longer or brighter than Gerry."
- Michael Almereyda, director

"Gerry Fialka's PXL THIS festival snaps, crackles and pops off the screen with the funky, user-friendly energy of real first-person cinema. Goofy, gorgeous, and altogether groovy, his provocative program of pieces produced with the Fisher-Price PXL 2000 toy video camera is not only downright entertaining, but more, its blipping and buzzing black 'n' white picture-bits coalesce into a veritable inspiration to all those who cherish the playful, spontaneous gestures and low-cost of electronic folk art."
- Craig Baldwin, director & curator.

"All the PXL THIS videos reflect festival organizer Gerry Fialka's commitment to the freedom produced by making art without financial constraints. PXL THIS is a welcome highlight in the Los Angeles media scene celebrating the rich lexicon available in a tool which might initially seem rather limiting."
- Holly Willis, LA Weekly.

"PXL is the ultimate people's video." - J. Hoberman, Premiere Magazine

Hollywood Reporter called Pixelvision a "precursor of today's DV filmmaking."

"When the aliens are here and deciding whether to vaporize all mankind for our inhumanity, cruelty and greed, showing the aliens PXL THIS will save the world. PXL THIS shows our best nature as humanist creators and subversives against those who deserve it. Save the world. Support PXL THIS." - George Manupelli, founder of the Ann Arbor Film Festival, filmmaker, poet, collagist and political/environmental activist

Cinesource PXL article by Gerry Fialka - http://cinesourcemagazine.com/index.php?/site/comments/pxl_triple_fake/

PXL THIS Director Fialka - hires 300 dpi still with PXL Cam - http://www.laughtears.com/images/Gerry-360dpi.jpg and Bio - http://www.laughtears.com/bio.html
PXL THIS 20 will also screen in San Fran in 2011 tba

PXL THIS 20 highlights include:
Always a favorite at PXL THIS, L M Sabo's OIL KILLS takes you on a journey of America's love affair with Big Oil and the devastating consequences. Press ready stills: http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/Oil-Kills-1.jpg & http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/Oil-Kills-2.jpg & http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/Oil-Kills-3.jpg &
http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/Oil-Kills-4.jpg & http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/Oil-Kills-5.jpg

Nicole & Michael Possert's ARROYO SECO RIVER SONG, starring George Willis, is a moving tribute to the most important tributary to the Los Angels River. This historical corridor has been home to Native Americans, missionaries, rancheros, explorers, artists and dreamers who have sculpted this valley into LA's seminal region. The founding of the City of Los Angels is at the confluence of these two rivers.  Press images: http://www.flickr.com/photos/2007pxl/sets/72157625268199688/
Philip Marion's SPOON & PACKET conjures a miniature parable for a larger world. Press ready stills: www.eveningalbum.com/SpoonAndPacketPXLstills.jpg

It's a family affair with visionary PXL-Dad Geoff Seelinger contributing 3 titles (two co-made with his children): BEACH DAY, LIGHT PLAY http://vimeo.com/17718439 - A dreams beach day is captured in high contrast, stuttered motion by the magic of a PXL2000. Abstractions are created through motion, reflections, hi-lights and shadow. The PXL images of beach activities to open up into an immense imaginary space.

Geoff's children: 7 year-old Donovan's SHRINGLY: SCI-ENCE http://vimeo.com/17687291 delves into the reaches of his imagination about the mysteries of extreme science. Donovan uses seeds in motion, layering and abstract images to illuminate possibilities and ideas of his fancy. A collaboration with PXL dad -- Geoff Seelinger

4 year-old Gwyneth's AND THEY PLAYED & THEY PLAYED & THEY PLAYED http://vimeo.com/17694873 shares a stream of consciousness, that includes stories from the heart, songs about poop, ugly words and other joyous indiscretions.

PXL THIS superstar Eli Elliott's ROXY RUBICON EPISODE 5 alternatively energizes Menippean satire and time warps all systems from collapsing, just in time to save the future. His SUZY & BRAD'S PINCHBACK bellows Bessie Smith blues big time.

With jubilant innocence four-year old Anwyn Lees remakes THE WIZARD OF OZ on the front porch with Mom & Dad.

Jesse Drew's DOLBY - Technocultural professor's industrial shots of factory job recalls Russian Constructivism.

Seminal cinema experimenter Bryan Konefsky's FERTILE GROUND CORPORATE SLUG suggests the nitty gritty influences of media visionary, Gene Youngblood (author of the ground-breaking book Expanded Cinema) as described by investigative journalist Greg Palast. http://vimeo.com/17020232
Award winning filmmaker Terri Sarris contributes three: DEAD MAN'S CLOTHES (Sarris & Frank Pahl - Oh, the stories second-hand things might tell...) and SPARKLE (Fourth of July, 2010) and GLITCH. http://vimeo.com/user3842874 Every decade sees one PXL that really captures the inherent uniqueness of Pixelvision. For example, James Benning's TABLETOP in the very first PXL THIS, and Lisa's Marr's RUGRAT in 2004. Sarris astutely utilizes PXL's innate characteristics in GLITCH.

Moving image artist extraordinaire David Sherman's PROJECTION/EJECTION shutters the ephemeral light in blinding the baseness of bodies in motion.

Squeezebox tickler Nick Newlin's TWICE AS NICE feels the love. Newlin interprets Thelonius on the accordion in MONK.

Michael Vile's THE MADGICIAN astounds with a floating cigarette.
PXL Pioneer tENTATIVELY a cONVENIENCE's PHILOSOPHER'S UNION MEMBER'S MOUTHPIECE yelps with fresh ideas from modern thinkers: Alan Rabbit Suit, Richard Tryzno Ellsberry and John Berndt.

Six-year-old Chester Burnett's CALIFORNIA STUDIOS playfully quakes the Hollywood template.
Paul Yates' DRAWBRIDGE demonstrates how surreal PXL in-camera effects can be. http://www.vimeo.com/4319553

Robin Carter's intriguing PYTHAGORAS AS POET explores the birth of science, mathematics, and philosophy. When the Phoenician's brought their writing system to the Greeks, it started a revolution of mind. In the midst of this, Pythagoras emerged in 500BC as the first philosopher. Myth and magic were as much apart of his world as number and theory. Since time immemorial the archivist of cultural knowledge was the poet, and Pythagoras followed this tradition and divined the properties numbers and space from the gods. The alphabet changed the world forever, as it changed the minds of the ancient Greeks. As the alphabet anchored in culture after culture, the mind of humankind has been shaped in kind, but as digital technology usurped the power of reading, what does that mean for us?

TROG ALLEY is another installment of Will Erokan's epic pxloitation compendium, Las Trampas, Joe recalls a highly transformative visionary experience, involving black magic, brotherhood symbolism & crystal meth. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSK4SSqLUGM

Venice Boardwalk performer Joe Nucci's SEE NOTE is the fourth episode in the captivating trilogy of hilarious limo driver recollections.

PSALM 4 "3" + ME by Giuseppe Nuccini evokes the Venetian Rock Opera.

Mary Jane Shoultz's SPILTERACY probes the death of the visual, linear straight-jackets of books as a plus. Schoultz, education professor, founder of the "open" school movement and a close advisor to Marshall McLuhan, Norman Mailer & Ivan Illich, updates our consciousness with the electric environment as the major learning tool. "Our young people are not illiterate, they are post-literate. Today's students want immediate roles, not far-off goals." - McLuhan. The "S" is SPILTERACY should be a dollar sign $. "The trouble with a cheap specialized education is that you never stop paying for it." - McLuhan

Stormin' Norman & Suzy Williams' VENICE LULLABY swings rag'n'roll with joyous passion.

Jason Danti's BIRD merges bebop visuals with music as ideas.

Robert Dobbs' SEX, DEATH & PIXELVISION reignites the Menippean marshalling of McLuhan's science and the certainty of obscure artifacts.

In WASTING TIME LOOKIN' IN THE MIRROR, Pixelator Dahvi Bolog realizes his life.

Mariko Drew's IT'S A LEMONHEAD - Grade school gals profess quizzical inquiries about life.
Rex Butters' 7 DUDLEY conjures a montage of Sponto Gallery home movies filmed in words.

Maureen Cotter's COWBOY PUSSY recounts her experiences as a chaplain in a mental hospital.

Gerry Fialka's PARALLEL WORLDER doubles the single unified theory as Martha Graham and WC Fields dig duality dancing in mysterious metaphors of Beefheartian time & Vorticist space.

PXL innovator Doug Ing provides two engaging shorts: DEATH (Ruminations on death by the Loor Children and 65 year old Phil Kaplan) and BEST LAVA VIEW RIGHT HERE (Ing, his father and friends explore the aftermath of a recent volcano eruption on the island of Hawaii from the balcony of a house amidst the lava field).

Pixelvision avatars Lisa Marr and Paolo Davanzo's GOOD GRIEF repurposes pop culture with pixelated wit
Arthur Coleman's FOG ON GLASS breathes gray azure over the mirror. His MARIGOLD SERENADE mutes ambient birdsongs.

Clifford Novey's ROUNDS comprehensively circles illusive visual domains.

Elric Kane's SLOW DRAW appropriates bad action films evoking something more intimate than mere on-screen carnage via Pixelvision.

PXL Pioneer Paul Bacca's TETRAHEDRALLY trips the light fantastic in grass roots guerrilla radio waves fashion, Former Second City Music Director and comedian Jonathan Menchin's HEY YOU IN THE FUTURE alerts wanna-bes not yet born.

Called the female Robert Johnson, Sunny War's SHEEP grazes musicality supreme.
Denny Moynahan's KING KUKULELE KOGNITION joins Denny's live self and PXL-self as they ruminate on his 46th birthdays' inner thoughts.

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PXL THIS 20 premiered Monday, Dec 13, 2010, two different shows 7 & 9pm at the Unurban Coffeehouse, 3301 Pico Blvd, Santa Monica, CA, 90404, 310-315-0056, free admission. More info: 310-306-7330 http://www.laughtears.com/
7pm:
1- THE WIZARD OF OZ - Anwyn Lees, 8 minutes*
2- CALIFORNIA STUDIOS - Chester Burnett, 3m*
3- AND THEY PLAYED & THEY PLAYED & THEY PLAYED - Gwyneth & Geoff Seelinger, 5m
4- BEACH DAY, LIGHT PLAY- Geoff Seelinger, 3m
5- SHRINGLY: SCI-ENCE - Donovan & Geoff Seelinger, 5m
6- 7 DUDLEY - Rex Butters, 3m*
7- TWICE AS NICE - Nick Newlin, 4m*
8- FOG ON GLASS - Arthur Coleman, 2m*
9- OIL KILLS - L. M. Sabo, 2m
10- PROJECTION/EJECTION - David Sherman - 3m
11- PYTHAGORAS AS POET - Robin Carter, 5m
12- SUZY & BRAD'S PINCHBACK - Eli Elliott, 4m
13- DEAD MAN'S CLOTHES - Terri Sarris & Frank Pahl, 3m
14- SPARKLE - Terri Sarris, 3m*
15- GLITCH - Terri Sarris, 3m
16- SPOON & PACKET - Philip Marion, 12m
17- SEE NOTE - Joe Nucci, 6m
18- PSALM 4 "3" + ME - Giuseppe Nuccini, 1m*
19- BEST LAVA VIEW RIGHT HERE - Doug Ing, 4m*
20- IT'S A LEMONHEAD - Mariko Drew, 3m*
21- DOLBY - Jesse Drew, 3m*
9pm:
22- KING KUKULELE KOGNITION - Denny Moynahan, 4m
23- ARROYO SECO RIVER SONG - Nicole & Michael Possert, 4m
24- ROUNDS - Clifford Novey, 6m
25- FERTILE GROUND CORPORATE SLUG - Bryan Konefsky, 4m
26- DRAWBRIDGE - Paul Yates, 3m*
27- SLOW DRAW - Elric Kane, 7m
28- THE MADGICIAN - Michael Vile, 3m*
29- VENICE LULLABY - Stormin' Norman Zamcheck & Suzy Williams, 3m*
30- COWBOY PUSSY - Maureen Cotter, 4m*
31- PARALLEL WORLDER - Gerry Fialka, 10m*
32- HEY YOU IN THE FUTURE - Jonathan Menchin, 4m
33- GOOD GRIEF - Lisa Marr & Paolo Davanzo, 2m
34- DEATH - Doug Ing, 5m*
35- TROG ALLEY - Will Erokan, 6m
36- ROXY RUBICON EPISODE 5 - Eli Elliott, 6m
37- WASTING TIME LOOKIN' IN THE MIRROR - Dahvi Bolog, 3m*
38- SHEEP - Sunny War, 4m*
39- SPILTERACY - Mary Jane Shoultz, 4m
40- MONK - Nick Newlin, 4m
41- SEX, DEATH & PIXELVISION - Robert Dobbs, 4m*
42- BIRD - Jason Danti, 4m*
43- MARIGOLD SERENADE - Arthur Coleman, 3m*
44- PHILOSOPHER'S UNION MEMBER'S MOUTHPIECE: Alan Rabbit Suit - tENTATIVELY a cONVENIENCE, 6m*
45-PHILOSOPHER'S UNIONMEMBER'S MOUTHPIECE:RichardTryzno Ellsberry-tENTATIVELYacONVENIENCE,6m*
46- PHILOSOPHER'S UNION MEMBER'S MOUTHPIECE: John Berndt - tENTATIVELY a cONVENIENCE, 6m*
47- TETRAHEDRALLY - Paul Bacca, 5m*
(*means this short will be shown on tour if time permits)

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Blur + Sharpen If it Works, It's Obsolete by Holly Willis  12-11-10
http://www.kcet.org/socal/voices/blur-sharpen/if-it-works-its-obsolete.html
Gerry Fialka is LA's tireless advocate for alternative media and DIY culture generally, and the creative potential of the PXL 2000, a cheap, plastic toy video camera made by Fisher-Price in the 1980s, in particular. The camera produces a glitchy, chunky black-and-white image that's, well, often quite beautiful. For 20 years, the Venice-based media proponent has been showcasing videos made with the PXL 2000 camera in the PXL This video festival, which returns with a celebratory 20th annual showcase this Monday night, December 13, with two shows (7:00 p.m. and 9:00 p.m.) at the Unurban Coffeehouse at 3301 Pico Blvd, Santa Monica. I took the anniversary as an opportunity to ask Gerry a few questions, starting with what makes the PXL 2000 camera interesting in a world where we now have so many video camera options.

"McLuhan said, 'If it works, it's obsolete,'" says Gerry. "The PXL is remarkable because it does not work." Gerry is referring here to the fact that the camera does not even attempt to mimic reality; it's not interested in clarity, resolution or fidelity. Instead, the camera produces a glimpse of the world, one that underscores visual manipulation and dismisses attempts at perfection. "Giving the viewer less information might mean more involvement by the viewer," Gerry suggests. "It enables the possibility of 'breakdown as breakthrough.'" Considering the array of camera options, Gerry adds, "There's lots of video cams on the market that have some similar features, but none with the unique gothic dreamy look - there are lots of cool words that have described its services and disservices!"

Shooting with the PXL 2000 is also fun. It's nicely shaped, lightweight, and now, nearly 30 years after its birth, boasts a sleek retro look that the little Flip video camera will never have. Oddly enough, the camera records onto sound cassettes, and the image itself is framed with a black matte, giving the resulting footage an elegant look in contrast with the chaos of the imagery itself. When you use a PXL Vision camera, you really have to negotiate with the camera; the process is about discovery rather than capture. "We are really about McLuhan's adage, 'We shape our tools, then they shape us,'" adds Gerry. "That's the meta-cognition here." He goes on to suggest that often artists try to rekindle the visionary delight of children, and using a toy contributes to that sense of creativity and rule-breaking.

Gerry notes that technically he does not "curate" the festival. "I show every entry," he explains. "We welcome kids and homeless people and rich art kids and so on. We celebrate a tool, and we leave it to the audience and press to make aesthetic judgments." He adds that audience reactions definitely shift each year. "'Anything that's popular is a rear-view image,'" Gerry adds, again quoting Marshall McLuhan. "We are not a popular festival." That said, the show is an annual highlight for those seeking offbeat imagery and storytelling, and creativity that emerges in dialogue with imperfect and magical toy tools. More info: 310-306-7330. [Images taken from a PXL 2000 user's manual, available here.] (scroll down for the complete answers from Fialka for Holly's questions)
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Toy-Camcorder Fest Focuses on Wild Imaginations by Hank Rosenfeld 12-14-10 Patch.com

http://patch.com/A-c7VP and http://santamonica.patch.com/articles/toy-camcorder-fest-focuses-on-wild-imaginations

PXL This 20, held at the Unurban coffee house, raised a junked toy to artistic heights, howls and hilarity on Monday night.

This was not your father's film festival. More like your funny uncle's.

PXL This 20–the 20th installment of the annual fest curated and hosted by Gerry Fialka–featured nearly four dozen very short films at Unurban on Monday night. They were all shot with the same kind of camera: the PXL 2000, a toy camcorder that was created by Fisher-Price and then discontinued two years later.

The market couldn't handle it back in 1987-89, but thanks to thrift stores, Web sites and family members, the camera–which sells for $40 to $60–is more popular than ever. Today, some experimental directors who dig the camera's funky, low-tech imagery have turned what was a failed toy into a cheapo art tool.

"The toy is much too important to be left [only] to children," Fialka said playfully Monday night–even though the fest included many films made by kids.

The first section of the festival featured pieces shot by children under 10 years old. "And They Played & They Played & They Played" was Gwyneth Seelinger's imaginative, sharply edited tour of her hobbies, while her older brother Donovan's "Shringly: Sci-ence" featured him explaining wormholes and time-travel.

"California Studios," a three-minute documentary, had Chester Burnett employing stuffed animals to give the history of a lost part of Hollywood history. Also featured during this segment: an eight-minute version of "The Wizard of Oz," where Anywn Lees' parents played all the parts, and the 4-year-old narrated and handled lensing chores.

"It's how we put our ideas down," 7-year-old Donovan Seelinger told the audience when asked why he used a PXL cam to explain his ideas about neutrons and space.
Can you say "inspired"?

Many of the PXL films have the grainy quality of Ingmar Bergman black-and-white starkness, or a ghostly bank-security cam.

"Marshall McLuhan said TV is tactile," Fialka explained. " 'Tactile' is exactly the chunky look the PXL 2000 illustrates. You can practically touch the roundness of the dots–all 2,000 of them."
A typical TV screen contains about 200,000 dots of light, or pixels.

"This is a magic toy," Fialka continued. "It's a utensil for creativity that reeks of humanity while Hollywood seems to believe only in spectacle."

PXL This 20 highlights included L M Sabo's "Oil Kills," Clifford Novey's "Rounds," Philip Marion's "Spoon & Packet" and Jonathan Menchin's "Hey You in the Future." Also featured were short musical delights by Brad Kay, Suzy Williams and Denny "King Kukulele" Moynahan; and the "Arroyo Seco River Song" by Nicole and Michael Possert.

Next year, the best of the fest, which included films from across the country and Europe, will play other venues, among them the Echo Park Film Center on May 19. Meanwhile, the entry deadline for PXL This 21 is Oct. 22; submissions can be sent in DVD form to Fialka (310-306-7330, pfsuzy@aol.com) at 2427 1/2 Glyndon Ave., Venice, CA 90291.

Fialka's own entry, "Parallel Worlder," was a culture-jamming mix of Georges Méliès' 1902 film "A Trip to the Moon" and local imagery. His philosophy behind the festival and his other entertainments?
"Think," he said, quoting musician George Clinton. "It ain't illegal yet." http://www.laughtears.com/
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Introducing Gerry Fialka's PXL THIS 20 Film Festival by Joseph Mael 11-30-10
http://www.examiner.com/santa-monica-city-buzz-in-los-angeles/introducing-gerry-fialka-s-pxl-this-20
"Curator Gerry Fialka puts together events of films both experimental and socially conscious."
- LA City Beat

Maybe certain happenings are meant to be kept discreet but then again there is always that “A-HA!” moment when circumstances lend to the belief that a certain happening is going to blow up. For the PXL THIS Film Festival, it hasn't happened yet. Or maybe it has. Creator of L.A.'s 2nd longest running film festival, Gerry Fialka, brings PXL THIS 20 to life to continue the underground legacy of the revolutionary PXL 2000 video camcorder on December 13th, 2010 at Unurban Cafe in Santa Monica. Produced by Fisher Price (there were 400,000 units released for sale from 1987 to 1989), this “toy” renders a unique video image and now has a legendary history that has firmly left a fingerprint on the history of film-making. The camera produces an image from 2,000 “dots” that is in contrast with modern film technology, particularly when held up to the 150,000+ dots on today's televison, the PXL 2000 elicits a unique image directors enjoy incorporating with heavy duty film machinery.

I had the opportunity to ask Gerry about this year's PXL THIS this week and here's how he answered a couple questions I found relevant:
Q: Can I get a quick reflection by you on PXL THIS 20? What does it mean to you?
A: What the PXL THIS Film Festival means to me is deconstructing moving image art-making and the whole idea of a film festival. We gather the community to share in the creative process, bare bones style. Both in making and in watching, PXL THIS encourages participation, the same way that the PXL image offers little and requires the viewers to heighten their awareness and fill in the blanks. The gap is where the action is - the resonating interval. In Marcel Duchampian spirit, how do you make a film festival that is not a film festival? T S Eliot said that poetry is outing your inner dialogue. What form is your inner dialogue in? Maybe its that dreamy illusive Pixelvision image for some. An extension of consciousness? The next medium ? The Non-physical? The possibility of a world without words? Low definition can mean high participation. PXL THIS means to me connectedness not consumerism, hoicking up an ecstatic new state of tribal immediacy and involvement, simultaneity, all-at-onceness. The Balinese have no word for art, they do everything as well as they can. I salute all Pixelators and PXL THIS audience members who for two decades have mustered up multi-dimensions and multi-sensuousness.
Q: Is PXL THIS the largest publicly accessible pixelvision collection in the world?
A: YES, our archives are stored at The Academy, which is truly a major hoot. The cheeziest genuine fake film festival in the world is treated by the most important Film Archives in the world with respect. They feel that its worth storing and preserving. It reflects what humans can do. As McLuhan said, we shape our tools then they shape us

Pixelvision History
Fialka, self-described as a para-media ecologist based in Venice, CA, is the visionary behind the PXL 2000 fetish. To say he has a way with words is an understatement. He describes the festival by stating, “PXL THIS features films made with the Fisher-Price PXL 2000 toy camcorder, is one of the longest running film festivals in the entertainment capital of the world. Celebrating "cinema povera" moving image art, it evokes Marcel Duchamp's axiom "Poor tools require better skills." Pixelators from across the globe hoick up inventive approaches to the unassuming throw-away of consumer culture. These low-tech hi-jinx films come through loud and clear by re-framing a new cinema language. Past PXL THIS participants have included Lee Ranaldo (Sonic Youth), Chris Metzler (Fishbone & Salton Sea documentaries), James & Sadie Benning, Joe Gibbons, Cecilia Dougherty, Peggy Ahwesh, Jesse Drew, Margie Strosser and Michael Almereyda.” When he describes how the outside world has described PXL THIS he proudly states, "We really love that the “New York Times” called PXL THIS “small” and that lots of our best entries come from Venice California’s Boardwalk performers (as in “houseless” — not homeless because the earth is everyone’s home)."

Pixelvision's history as a tool of choice by experimental filmmakers took off after a grant by the Rockefeller Foundation was awarded to Sadie Benning for her work with the PXL 2000 in 1993. PXL 2000 footage was used in the films Slacker (1991) and Hamlet (2000). Over time, from its brief period on the shelves as a toy for for children to current day, the PXL 2000 format has resurfaced from a failed technology to a prized cult object that even became a thesis topic for some students (McCarty, 2005).

“There is something about the quality of the image that is really dreamlike and it has a feeling of being in the past already even though you just shot it. It is not quite reality or not quite representational of what's really happening at that moment, so it already has this distancing effect of feeling like it's already in the past somehow. “
– Sadie Benning, Award-winning Pixelvision artist

Most of the videos included in the PXL THIS 20 film festival are between 3 and 6 minutes in length though some of the gems in past PXL THIS festivals extended over ten minutes in duration. The festival's following is quite dedicated but it somehow keeps a low profile. If you missed the October submission deadline, don't fret, this film festival has a cult-like following and Fialka receives a growing number of entries each passing year. If you have old PXL 2000 films laying around, your entry into the next PXL THIS is always welcome. Fialka says, "Pixelators return to innocence by using, and even misusing, moving image art to view worlds that usually go unnoticed, evoking children's spirited desire to explore."

Low brow, or high brow? You decide, but as J. Hoberman of Premier Magazine said, “PXL is the ultimate people's video.”

Gerry Fialka believe's PXL THIS is best described by his hero, George Manupelli, founder of the Ann Arbor Film Festival, who said, “When the aliens are here and deciding whether to vaporize all mankind for our inhumanity, cruelty and greed, showing the aliens PXL THIS will save the world. PXL THIS shows our best nature as humanist creators and subversives against those who deserve it. Save the world. Support PXL THIS.” Yep, that's a tough thought to top.

The Show Details
The PXL THIS 20 film festival screens December 13th at the (underrated) Unurban Cafe in Santa Monica (3301 Pico Blvd.), and admission is FREE.

The 6PM pre-show features a sneak preview of Wickstead's Wonder - an interview with James Wickstead, the inventor of the Fisher Price PXL 2000 camcorder! In October, PXL THIS 19 was held in San Francisco, and Wickstead introduced the first (and possibly only) PXL 2000 color camcorder. No word on if this will be part of the L.A. festivities, but perhaps there is a chance.

"Gerry Fialka’s annual PXL THIS is a reliably surprising and seductive round-up of recent work achieved with the PXL 2000 camera. This humble outdated “toy” continues to bring out the visionary child in filmmakers and viewers alike, and no one has kept the PXL flame burning longer or brighter than Gerry." - Michael Almereyda, director
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more PXL THIS 20 press:
http://www.broowaha.com/articles/8643/introducing-gerry-fialkas-pxl-this-20-film-festival
http://www.campuscircle.com/calendar/calendar_event.cfm?ceid=6124
________________________________

PXL PERFECT? by Gerry Fialka - Answers to four Holly Willis questions for
her blog http://www.kcet.org/socal/voices/blur-sharpen/
HW-1• there's been a tremendous proliferation of inexpensive video cameras in the last few years, including the Flip: what makes the PXL 2000 camera remain remarkable? Can people still find these cameras? And is there any similar camera currently on the market?

GF- McLuhan said, "if its works, it obsolete." PXL is remarkable because it does not work. It depends on what you mean by remarkable, one audience member said that with all the great new digital effects/equipment seems as though you could "fix" the picture...duchamp said that poorer tools require better skills...without even making a value judgement, i'd say that one can make moving image art BOTH with expensive or non expensive tools.. we are really about mcluhan's "we shape our tools, then they shape us," that's the meta-cognition hEAR.

***remarkable that PXL is a failed toy yet continued to be used as a creative tool (or as the la weekly said one year - a tool for creativity AND adolescent regression, whatta want from a kids toy? amy taubin said just pickin one up is breakin the rules, aren't artist tryin to evoke children's innocence, it continues to delight the visionary child in pixelators, so why not just start out with a kids toy, the balinese have no word for art, they do everything as well as they can...like the joke: kid comes of age when he realizes his dad goes to work, kid- dad what is your job? art teaching dad-i teach people how to draw, kid- you mean they forgot?).
***it's remarkable because giving the viewer less info might mean more involvement by the viewer (user as content) or simply have folks react with "this sucks"...so it enables the possibility of "breakdown as break-through"...

"Anything that's popular is a rear-view image" -McLuhan. We are not a popular festival.
YES, you can still get one of the 400,000 that were made - on ebay, or thrift shops or garage sales, etc
There's lots of vid cams on the market that have some similar features, but none with the unique gothic dreamy (lots of cool words that have described its services and disservices) look and this amazin analog to digital bkgrnd and history

HW- 2• have there been any noticeable aesthetic shifts in the videos you've programmed for this year's festival as opposed to festivals in the past?

GF- i don't really program, i show every entry, we celebrate a tool, we leave it to the audience and press to make aesthetic judgements, opinions..havin studied and developed my own personal aesthetics, yes there are shifts every year and the same ol'thing, but a rare gem comes thru, not worth stopping.

but every year the audience reactions change...defining what you and me mean by aesthetic shifts and what the normal person on the street is different.. we welcome kids and homeless people and rich art kids and so on..
********MOST IMPORTANT= SEEING AND ATTENDING our festival LIVE is really what its ALL ABOUT.. the highly desired communal experience that expands cinema by combining performance art, poetry (thats what pxl really is poetry, outting your inner dialogue, your inner consciousness, poerty/pxl can communicate before its understood, both of these are applied "t s elliot"), music, dance with film has been featured for years at PXL THIS and a critic cannot experience it fully by seeing a video document of it in their lonely teenage room on a TV set (referring to King Kukulele's 10 years of combing his filmic self with his PXL-self). Then again, evoking Zappa, we are satirizing the tribe, rugged individualism and perpetutaing the myth.

HW- 3• as video becomes more and more an everyday vernacular, what makes a video festival-worthy, in your opinion?

GF- any and every gathering of people to discuss the effects of our inventions is worthy, even if its nano-community, we are fine with being called a "small " festival in the NY TIMES, and, at the same time, thriving for 20 years, and being shown in New Zealand, UK and across North America & US with fiery discussions always included. In pizza parlors and art museums.

***worthy to study the hidden effects of hybridizing a light through medium (TV, video) and a light on medium (film, stain glass) (seeing it in the movie theater setting, with a video projector)..

***worthy for festivals like PXL THIS to hoick up satire to uncover the hidden environments of moving image art...we are a genuine fake film festival - havin no entry fee, no budget, no nothing...(sometimes staring at a blank screen, which is what has happened at past PXL THIS festivals, that's the McLuhan "Media Fast," that media ecology, that's sustainability.)

***a video festival enables people to be antenae of the race, thats what ezra pound called artists - "the antennae of the race" broadcasting the hidden effects of what we invent, so we can learn how to COPE with these effects. As James Joyce said to all us finnegans "WAKE," "wake up and learn and unlearn what video festivals, tv, pixelvision all do to you." Needle the somnabulist to cord-cut the cloud?

HW- 4 • if you had to single out one or two of the most significant cultural shifts related to video in our culture, what would they be?

GF- "Culture is our business" - McLuhan.

The opportunity to actually read, study and discuss McLuhan, Joyce & Robert Dobbs via free events like http://www.venicewake.org/ and http://www.venicewake.org/Events/current.html Delving deep into McLuhan's translation of FINNEGANS WAKE by james joyce (he invented facebook and disguised it as a book). Dobbs' translation of them both transforms and reinvents percept plunder for the recent future. Video screenings are available in public meetings and online to uncover the hidden effects of video, and why we ignore the hidden effects.

"The next medium - whatever it is - may be an extension of consciousness. It will include television as its content, not as its environment and will transform television into an art form." - McLuhan.
______________________________
PXL 2000 Inventor- James Wickstead (of JWDA) jwda@wicksteaddesign.com,
Article on Wickstead-
http://www.dailyrecord.com/article/20101102/BUSINESS05/101101065/1003/BUSINESS/Cedar-Knolls-N.J.-inventor-applying-experience-to-new-technology
Cedar Knolls N.J. inventor applying experience to new technology by Sally Silverman 11-2-10 The Daily Record HANOVER — James Wickstead is founder of James Wickstead Design Associates in Cedar Knolls, a company that specializes in product development for the medical, telecom, commercial and consumer markets. Founded in 1968, JWDA has generated more than 40 patents and product licenses on behalf of clients including AT&T, C.R. Bard, Becton Dickenson, Fisher Price, Parker Brothers, Siemans and many more. Most sought after products: "Anything new in technology like applications for software, global positioning systems and wireless applied to all products," Wickstead said. His best inventions: The Black & Decker vegetable steamer; a patient-controlled analgesia device; a device to measure the chemistry of animals by analyzing their blood called the Vettest; and the PXL-2000 camcorder for Fisher-Price. Worst invention: A device that uses high-energy plasma to cure arthritis. "We are asked to implement somebody else's idea. Whether it sells, is something else," Wickstead said. Inventor's traits: "Everybody is an inventor, but you need a massive amount of curiosity and look at things as to how they can be made better," Wickstead said. Beginnings: Wickstead was born in Pompton Plains in 1941 and grew up there. After high school, he attended Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, where he received a degree in industrial design. "While in high school, I didn't know this type of work existed," Wickstead said. "I was interested in building cars, but an uncle of mine who was a landscape architect suggested industrial design. Before that, I was considering mechanical engineering," he said. Career path: After working for several small companies in New York and Philadelphia, Wickstead was drafted to serve in the U.S. military in Vietnam. He was stationed at the Aberdeen (Md.) Proving Ground as a scientist for two years, where he worked on armor and battle tanks. "It was the think tank for the Army — they would give us a problem and want a solution in 30 days," he said. Following military service, Wickstead founded his company, fist in Maryland then in Glen Rock. "There were lots of design firms, but they couldn't make products or get them into the marketplace," Wickstead said. Back to Jersey: "I camped all over the United States to determine the best place to locate my company and came here in 1979," he said. At home: Wickstead lives in Mendham with his wife, Jean. He enjoys fly fishing, hiking and, as a car enthusiast, he still does all the mechanical work on his two "old" Ferraris.
*****************************
Program Notes for San Francisco Cinematheque's AN INVENTION WITHOUT A FUTURE -
PIXELVISION: ELECTRONIC FOLK ART. (comprehensive history of PXL THIS and Pixelvision)
http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:VT1Pm-oc9goJ:www.sfcinematheque.org/ee/images/uploads/PN2_10PXL.PDF+%22san+francisco+cinematheque%22+pxl&hl=en&gl=us&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEESii8N3c8YRRSdwGAdMDLt-VKxQRzG6MQ09Mj0i2zVNcte74oKqNp8XdA54dGE5LuWvVYUo96Z5hbhzIb_qYhhkkroluQYFeIiCSzSl6-Wp4wcbyC7fDzlR3Wr60Hi_x_HME_Zit&sig=AHIEtbTh3oEPNjWhZHgpiIsAm0RS4PQrMQ
Andrea Nina McCarthy's 2005 MIT thesis "Toying With Obsolescence: Pixelvision Filmmakers & The Fisher Price PXL 2000 Camera" is essential reading.
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:pwHJLt5QPRkJ:cms.mit.edu/research/theses/AndreaMcCarty2005.pdf+pxl+2000+mit&cd=2&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us
Pixelvision enables filmmakers to tap into that child-like innocence all artists seek in the creative process. What could be easier than starting with a kids toy. John Lane's 2001 book Timeless Simplicity articulates wabi-sabi, "the perfect antidote to the pervasively slick style of homogenized efficency." Pixelvisionaries evoke the spirit of Wabi-sabi: "This elusive philosphy is about sufficiency and restraint. It is about simplicity, the minor and hidden, the modest and humble, the imperfect and the evanescent. It is about treading lightly on the planet. An added dimension is its implicit message urging us to forget the seductions of success - wealth, status, power and luxury."
"As for the PXL 2000 camera, because it’s a child’s toy there’s a certain naiveté which is inherent in the productions. Yet due to its technology, the PXL 2000 camera produces these edgy, gritty, “rough as a night in jail” images. I find the juxtaposition of these two attributes very interesting and useful in many of the politically oriented pieces I’ve produced.   From a technical perspective, I would say my primary contribution to the field is that I created a filmmaking style using the PXL 2000 which I call Machinima Vérité. Machinima Vérité combines Machinima (creating movies from 3D PC game engines) with Cinéma Vérité techniques to create a sense of realism. So basically I produce and render the movie from a game engine on a PC, display the video on a high resolution LCD, and recapture the video on the LCD using a PXL 2000 camera. My videos “CATACLYSM” and “bursting in air” are a couple of examples of this technique.   I really appreciate all of the effort Gerry Fialka puts in with the PXL THIS festival. If it weren’t for Gerry, interest in the PXL 2000 would have died out many years ago." - L. M. Sabo
*************************
PXL THIS 21 - Entry deadline Oct 22, 2011 - simply send a dvd to Gerry Fialka 2427 1/2 Glyndon Ave, Venice, CA 90291, 310-306-7330, pfsuzy@aol.com NO entry fee.

PXL THIS Director Gerry Fialka is available for Pixelvision & Media Ecology workshops. http://www.laughtears.com/workshops.html "Fialka's workshops are in depth communication of something extremely elusive - the history of the unimaginable - and his lively interpretation renders it useful." - William Farley, Award-winning filmmaker

michaelkoshkin@gmail.com is making a documentary about Pixelvision.
Best Of PXL THIS (13-19) screened at Dallas Video Festival Sept 25, 2010 at 6pm http://www.videofest.org/
PXL THIS 19 screened http://www.laughtears.com/PXL-THIS-19.htmlthe Sat, Oct 23 at 8:30pm at Other Cinema, 992 Valencia St (& 21st), San Fran CA 94110, 415-648-0654, admission $6 http://www.othercinema.com/
Gerry Fialka & Jon Rappoport on Progressive Radio Network 11-15-10 http://garynull.squarespace.com/the-jon-rappoport-show/
and Gerry on Music For Nimrods at midpoint in 3 hr show  http://www.mediafire.com/?daa6kzkpdodm013

PXL THIS 10 (2000)

2011-02-14T09:57:00.000-08:00

PXL THIS TEN - Celebrating its 10th year!
The tenth annual festival featuring videos made with the PXL-2000 toy camera premiered on Saturday, November 18 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. This unique festival featured videos made with a plastic video camcorder (manufactured 1987 -1989) that records sound and images directly onto audiocassettes. The November 18th premiere showcased record 4 hours plus of works by 27 pixelators from across the United States!

EVENT CALENDAR
November 18, 2000 - PXL THIS 10 - complete version (Midnight Special)
February 16, 2000 - PXL THIS 10 - 90-minute "Best Of" versions (Vidiots)

SUBMISSIONS
COTG is now accepting entries for PXL THIS ELEVEN scheduled for 2001. For more information, please send SASE: PXL 2427 1/2 Glyndon Ave., Venice, CA 90291, 310-306-7330. Thanks to everyone who helps.

PXL THIS TEN highlights (click on links for streaming video):

Ten year-old Brady Smith utilizes the toy camera meant for his age group to create canine choreography in Dancing Dog. It's a floppy-eared fandango rendering self-reflexive hilarity.

What happens when a lonely guy finds himself instantly desirable through his computer screen? Jeff Shepherd's Cyber Spaced takes us deep into the heart of one such guy, and the computer woman he meets.

Alfred Shoots Adolf is photographer Alfred Benjamin's story of what happened to him at the age of 18 in Germany (1934) when he looked at the enemy staring back at him through his camera lens.

Songman Mark Hecht bellows a maniac love song with passion in Thinking of You.

Osteological orator Rich Ferguson renews the schizophrenic skeletal structure of his own human condition in Bones.

Post Military Era is Phil Chamberlin's astute explaination of global demilitarization, which JFK advocated as General and Complete Disarmament.

Kahlil Sabbagh vocalizes melody with muscle in Camel Jockey.

COMPLETE LIST - 7:00pm show
King Kukluele Squared - Denny Moynahan, 5 minutes
File - Josh McLeod, 12 minutes
Dancing Dog - Brady Smith, 5 minutes
Bones - Rich Ferguson, 3 minutes
Alfred Shoots Adolf - Gerry Fialka, 7 minutes
Ghost Story - Joe Frese, 4 minutes
Georgesstach.com - Michael Possert, 5 minutes
Push Butt - Eli Elliott, 9 minutes
Scape - Doug Ing, 1 minute
Giggles - Farrah Rocker, 6 minutes
Donkeys, Pigs & Greens - Betsy Kalin, 6 minutes
Book of Dreams: A Trip Thru Kerouac's Lowell - Lee Randalo, 7 minutes
Blast From The Past - Paul Bacca, 10 minutes
House of Psychotic Redheads - Pet Rigot, 29 minutes

COMPLETE LIST - 9:00pm show
Closets Crushes Confusion and Sex - Irwin Swirnoff, 22 minutes
Cyber Spaced - Jeffrey SHepherd, 5 minutes
Par Avion - James Balsam, 7 minutes
Post Military Era (PME) - Phil Chamberlin, 12 minutes
Trip For Fireworks - D.J. Beard, 4 minutes
Mistake - Rich Ferguson, 2 minutes
Leonard and the Mountain - Chris Metzler & Jeff Springer, 12 minutes
Born To Hold You In My Arms - Dave Edison, 4 minutes
Pudding Didn't Do It - Farrah Rocker, 4 minute
Camel Jockey - Kahlil Sabbagh, 3 minutes
Crock - Mark Hejnar, 1 minute
Ode To A PEnis - Kate Perotti, 1 minute
Sacred Cow - Mark Hejnar, 1 minute
Trooper Authority - Mark Hejnar, 1 minute
Maggot's Cowboy Song - Mark Hejnar, 1 minute
Thinking of You - March Hecht, 4 minutes
Death Roach 2000 - Paul Bacca, 5 minutes
D.I.(Y.): No Place To Rock - Jeff Jobson, 30 minutes

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. Check out- http://elvis.rowan.edu/~cassidy/pixel/ for more about the PXL 2000
Check out http://jesgrew.org/wake for the Marshall McLuhan/Finnegans Wake Reading Club, moderated by Jerry Fialka
Click Pixel Pix Picks on othercinema.com for a review of PXL This 10 by Peggy Nelson

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.

Entry Rules: 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. Please include a synopsis and THREE 33-cent stamps with each entry. 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 Santa Monica video store, Vidiots #310-392-8508 exclusively rents various PXL THIS compilations.

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."

PXL THIS 11 (2001)

2011-02-14T09:56:00.000-08:00

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."

PXL THIS 12 (2002)

2011-02-14T09:53:00.000-08:00

PXL THIS TWELVE, the twelfth annual festival featuring videos made with the PXL-2000 toy camera, will premiere on Saturday, November 9, 2002 at 7:00 and 9:00 pm (two different shows) at Midnight Special Bookstore, 1318 Third Street Promenade, Santa Monica, CA 90401, 310.393.2923.
Free Admission. The PXL THIS website is www.indiespace.com/pxlthis

PXL THIS TWELVE screened SAT. APRIL 26, 2003, at 8PM at Other Cinema, 992 Valencia St. San Fran, www.othercinema.com

PXL THIS TWELVE, the twelfth annual festival featuring videos made with the PXL-2000 toy camera, premiered on February 2, 2003 at 8:00 pm at VIDIOTS, 302 Pico Blvd, Santa Monica CA Free Admission. 310-392-8508 (all shorts listed below will be shown except #18, 26, 27) The PXL THIS website is www.indiespace.com/pxlthis

PXL THIS TWELVE highlights include:Eli Elliott's eye-opening PXLMATION is the first ever Pixelvision animation. Ellen Lake's RUBBER BAND BALL documents San Francisco's Kishek brothers' quest to build the world's largest rubber band ball. Clark Nickolai's REMGLA PREPUTCHNA unveils a recently-discovered "lost" instructional film from Eastern Europe. John Snyder's LOCALS is a tribute to the everchanging face of Venice, California. Inspired alternatively by the writings of Pope Gregory and Seventeen Magazine, Dwight Swanson's LUST examines the joys and dangers of immorality. NOT UNACCOMPANIED BY A CHILD finds avant-garde pacifist Phil Chamberlin dealing with a concerned Mother (Lisa Robins & her daughter Renata) and playground rules. Michael Possert's HOLLYWOOD OPERATION is an outrageous TV commercial spoof for a kid's board game. Eliot Fons & Tedi Tate's INTEGRATRON explores Palm Desert's big wooden dome, originally constructed as a cell-regenerator, time machine and! spaceship beacon. Denny Moynahan goes live in QUEEN KUKULELE. Blueswoman Victoria Gibson wails GOSPEL IN THE BLUES. Eugene Gonzales gets LOST IN A DREAM walking his dog. Stacy Craft’s DOWN THERE is about growing up to be the bad girl everyone scorns. Steve and Ross Craig’s ART HACKS BABBLE toys with the "art question" as it alternates between realism and abstraction, organized structure and chaos. Gerry Fialka’s WHAT HAVEN’T YOU NOTICED LATELY? hoicks the "open past" while double delving into Giordano Bruno’s theory that everything in nature is realized through interaction with its opposite and Marshall McLuhan’s percept that "objects are unobservable, only relationships among objects are observable" simultaneously probing the option of "see-say" in moving pictures. "Do you hear what I’m seeing?" Future Bible Heros bring the music out of the dark in Duncan Macleod’s HOPELESS. Bryan Konefsky’s ALBUQUERQUE DIARY documents an uninvited street performer upstaging the other acts! in the annual Route 66 Santa Claus parade. Doug Ing’s DIP overflows in a surreal dream involving a tub and a telephone. Robin Carter’s SONG OF THE AURORA is an expose on the sun-earth connection via the magnetospheric sounds and images of the Northern Lights. Anthony Temple’s EXITING THE TATE considers Goeffrey Sonnabend’s theory by sampling images created within the realm of memory and reorganizes them into a stronger semblance based on repetition, obscuring, and juxtaposition. Elric Kane magically merges John Zorn music and abstract video feedback in COMBINATIONS. ELI ON ERNIE is Eli Elliott’s irreverent take on Ernie Kovaks’ television skit "The Nairobi Trio." Joanne Wallace’s autobiographical DAIRY addresses the boundaries of fiction and actuality. Jesse Seay’s DROWNED explores the desires of what the audience wants to see and lessons on looking foolish. David Teague’s BIRD SONGS IN YOUR GARDEN surveys the sounds of Ornithology. Jenette Isaacson & Bryan Konefsky con! template textures in WHAT WILL I DO. Peggy Ahwesh & Margie Strosser’s STRANGE WEATHER deals with a quartet of crack addicts in Miami, just sitting around, while outside the biggest hurricane of the century is about to hit. The mystery of "how real is it" becomes the focus of this "insider perspective" or privileged access into fringe culture.

Film programmers and curators - please be aware that 3 different PXL THIS programs (90 to 120 minutes each) are available for rent by contacting Gerry Fialka, phone 310-306-7330 for details and be sure to leave your phone, fax and mailing address if you get his phone machine. These 3 programs are BEST OF PXL THIS (the first 10 years), PXL THIS TEN and PXL THIS ELEVEN. They have screened successfully in San Fran-OtherCinema.com, the Ann Arbor Film Festival, New York-rbmc.net, Vancouver-blindinglight.com, Irvine,CA, Austin,TX, Albq., NM, Seattle, Eugene and Portland,OR. These are truly dynamic shows of low-tech video folk art that can draw big crowds.

Clap Off They Glass presents PXL THIS TWELVE

7:00pm

1- QUEEN KUKULELE - Denny Moynahan, 5 minutes
2- HOLLYWOOD OPERATION - Michael Possert, 1m
3- NOT UNACCOMPANIED BY A CHILD - Phil Chamberlin, 5m
4- SONG OF THE AURORA - Robin Carter, 5m
5- DOWN THERE - Stacy Craft, 1m
6- RUBBER BAND BALL - Ellen Lake, 3m
7- ART HACKS BABBLE - Steve & Ross Craig, 9m
8- WHAT HAVEN’T YOU NOTICED LATELY? - Gerry Fialka, 5m
9- HOPELESS - Duncan Macleod, 3m
10- PXLMATION - Fialka & Elliott, 1m
11- LOCALS - John Snyder, 5m
12- GOSPEL IN THE BLUES - Victoria Gibson, 2m
13- ALBUERQUE DIARY: 12-23-01 - Bryan Konefsky, 4m
14- DIP - Doug Ing, 3m
15- LOST IN A DREAM - Eugene Gonzales, 5m
16- BIRD SONGS IN YOUR GARDEN - David Teague, 4m
17- WHAT WILL I DO - Konefsky & Jenette Isaacson, 4m
18- DAIRY- Joanne Wallace, 15m

9:00pm

19- EXITING THE TATE - Anthony Remple, 7m
20 - LUST - Dwight Swanson, 7m
21- INTEGRATRON - Tedi Tate & Eliot Fons, 5m
22- COMBINATIONS - Elric Kane, 4m
23- ELI ON ERNIE - Eli Elliott, 5m
24- DROWNED - Jesse Seay, 12m
25- REMGLA PREPUTCHNA - Clark Nikolai, 2m
26- SLICE OF CAKE - Paul Bacca, 5m
27- STRANGE WEATHER - Peggy Ahwesh & Margie Strosser, 50m

COTG is always accepting entries for future PXL THIS festivals. For info send SASE: PXL 2427 ½ Glyndon Av, Venice CA 90291, 310-306-7330. MUCHO thanks to everyone who helps. Vidiots (310-392-8508) rents various PXL THIS compilations and will screen PXL THIS TWELVE on Feb 21, 2003. PXL THIS web page - indiespace.com/pxlthis

PXL THIS TWELVE highlights include:

In Betsy Kalin's ANTHEM, women celebrate an empowering feminist classic.
Eli Elliott's eye-opening PXLMATION is the first ever Pixelvision animation.
Ellen Lake's RUBBER BAND BALL documents San Francisco's Kishek brothers' quest to build the world's largest rubber band ball.
Clark Nickolai's REMGLA PREPUTCHNA unveils a recently-discovered "lost" instructional film from Eastern Europe.
John Snyder's LOCALS is a tribute to the everchanging face of Venice, California.
Inspired alternatively by the writings of Pope Gregory and Seventeen Magazine, Dwight Swanson's LUST examines the joys and dangers of immorality.
NOT UNACCOMPANIED BY A CHILD finds avant-garde pacifist Phil Chamberlin dealing with a concerned Mother (Lisa Robins & her daughter Renata) and playground rules.
Michael Possert's HOLLYWOOD OPERATION is an outrageous TV commercial spoof for a kid's board game.
Eliot Fons & Tedi Tate's INTEGRATRON explores Palm Desert's big wooden dome, originally constructed as a cell-regenerator, time machine and spaceship beacon.
Also another gem from Denny Moynahan, the Ernie Kovacs of Pixelvision and much more.

Established in 1991, Clap Off They Glass Production supports independent video-making by sponsoring the annual PXL THIS Festival, which is the oldest of its kind in the world. With no corporate sponsors, no color brochures, no big shot movie director board members, no ticketmaster access, PXL THIS has been featured on PBS, IFC and NPR. RES magazine praised PXL THIS as "a welcome highlight in the Los Angeles media scene celebrating the rich lexicon available in a tool which might initially seem rather limiting."

PXL THIS spans many genres: documentary, poetry, drama, art, music, political activism, cinema povera, comedy and the avant-garde. The unique Fisher-Price toy camcorder PXL 2000, which records sound and image directly onto audio cassettes, continues to empower artists. This failed toy was only made in the US from 1987 to 1989. The magical PXL 2000 restores a certain humanity to the overpowering technology of video. "PXL is the ultimate people's video."
- J. Hoberman, Premiere Magazine.

"All the PXL THIS videos reflect festival organizer Gerry Fialka's commitment to the freedom produced by making art without financial constraints."
- Holly Willis, LA Reader.

"In past years, PXL THIS gave us some fascinating work...definitely an out-there experience. In the last few years, PXL videos have made it to such hallowed domains as the Whitney Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, Sundance, and the London Film Festival, where they have been admired for their characteristic spontaneity, highly personal perspective, visual uninhibitedness and raw, grainy truths."
- Mary Beth Crain, LA Weekly.

"PXL THIS is worthy of praise...spellbinding. The shifting bricks of light and dark that form the Fisher-Price PXL 2000's picture lend themselves well to personal essays, creating an invigorating mesh of ambiguity and intimacy in every frame."
- Paul Malcolm, LA Weekly.

"Gerry Fialka's PXL THIS festival snaps, crackles and pops off the screen with the funky, user-friendly energy of real first-person cinema. Goofy, gorgeous, and altogether groovy, his provocative program of pieces produced with the Fisher-Price PXL 2000 toy video camera is not only downright entertaining, but more, its blipping and buzzing black 'n' white picture-bits coalesce into a veritable inspiration to all those who cherish the playful, spontaneous gestures and low-cost of electronic folk art."
-Filmmaker/curator Craig Baldwin.

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."

PXL THIS 13 (2003)

2011-02-14T09:46:00.000-08:00

PXL THIS 13 screened:

11-15-03 Midnight Special Bookstore, Santa Monica CA
2-20-04 Vidiots, Santa Monica, CA
4-24-04 Other Cinema, San Fran, CA
5-27-04 Echo Park Film Center, CA
7-24-04 Maestri Gallery, Bakersfield, CA
9-8-04 Subterranean Cinema, Jacksonville, FL members.aol.com/bunchastuf/souvenir.html Steve Rose's SOUVENIR (PXL THIS 13) website

Read praise from the press in THE BLACKBOARD article on the articles page.

The PXL THIS 13 DVD is available from Gerry Fialka, phone:310-306-7330 or pfsuzy@aol.com

"PXL This 13" DVD reviewed by Mike Langlie on liarsociety.com Feb, 2005

In 1987, Fisher Price released the PXL2000 Pixelvision camera, a toy that captured 5 minutes of grainy, low-res, black-and-white video and audio to a side of a normal tape cassette. A little too over-priced and under-sophisticated for its intended market, the toy was quickly killed. Not surprisingly, it became a much sought-after tool by experimental video artists and a steady cult of followers ever since. The PXL This film festival is now in its 14th year of presenting works made with the device by a wide demographic of amateurs and professionals. The films from the 13th year are collected on DVD, and as expected, it's a mixed bag. I'm a big fan of the quirky and obscure, but even I found a few of the titles unwatchable. But there are some short pieces here that even the most jaded and impatient viewer will find delightful.

My favorites include 8-year-old Juniper Woodbury's stream-of-consciousness visual essay About Flowers, Denny Moynahan's
moebius strip of a performance piece Kukulele Cubed, Stephen Rose's dreamy trip inside a snow-globe Souvenir, and festival coordinator Gerry Fialka's inventive DaDa mini-manifesto Double-Duty Interrobang.

The strengths and limitations of the PXL2000 are explored in some imaginative ways as the creators attempt to find their unique voices. John Humphrey's Pee Wee Goes to Prison makes entertaining use of dolls and miniatures as cast and set in a story that's hysterical but a little too long for the format. Tedi Tate and Eliot Fons' Horse contrasts ghostly long-range Muybridge-style footage with startling super-close-ups of equine facial features. It's an inspiring bunch, at least in that it's obvious how much fun these folks have making art on the cheap. Now to get my own Pixelvision running again...

PXL THS 13, Midnight Special Bookstore, Nov 15,2003
7:00pm
1-KUKULELE CUBED - Denny Moynahan, 3 minutes
2-THE STEPFATHER - Joe Gibbons, 8m
3- 30TH ST - Jason Bickford, 2m
4- ABOUT FLOWERS - Juniper Woodbury, 4m
5- WORDS - Walter Liggett, 1m
6- HORSE - Tedi Tate & Eliot Fons, 5m
7- DOUBLE-DUTY INTERROBANG - Gerry Fialka, 10m
8- POETRY WORKSHOP - Walter Liggett, 2m
9- MARKER - Juniper Woodbury, 2m
10- SPECIAL REPORT - Michael Possert, 2m
11- MOVING VIOLATION - Jason Britski, 6m
12- PATIENT - Doug Ing, 9m
13- DOWNTOWN ODYSSEY - Joe Golling, 4m
14- VICTIM! The AMY FISHER Story - Dwight Swanson, 7m
15- STAND UP - Martin Smith, 4m
16- ASSCROFT - Eli Elliott, 6m
17- THE GLUM WALTZ - Elric Kane, 22m

9:00pm
18- BURNT POPCORN - Eli Elliott, 20m
19- SOUVENIR - Stephen Rose, 5m
20- PEE WEE GOES TO PRISON - John Humphrey, 11m
21- PXL MANIFESTO - Ross Craig, 5m
22- FAMILIAR - Stacy Craft, 8m
23- NEO-CON HYBRIDS - Steve Craig, 4m
24- HIPPIES USE SIDE DOOR - Dahvi Bolog, 6m

THE SIMPLICITY OF FACELESSNESS - Kyzer McKinn,
OUTSIDE THE LAW - Luci Westphal-Solary, 3m
27- ROOMATEY AGAIN: The Strange Case of the Gay Pirate Penguin - Nicholas Zeltzer, 9m
28- MEAT THE JOHNSONS - Chuck Perry, 6m
29- LAWN STATUES - Joe Frese, 19m

Clap Off They Glass is always acceptimg entries for future PXL THIS festivals. For info send SASE: PXL 2427 ½ Glyndon Av, Venice, CA,90291, 310-306-7330. Much thanks to everyone who helps.

Vidiots(310-392-8508) rents PXL THIS compilations & will screen PXL THIS 13 on Feb 20, 2004.

Contact: Gerry Fialka 310-306-7330

PXL THIS 13, the annual festival featuring videos made with the PXL 2000 toy camera, will premiere on Saturday, NOV. 15 2003 at 7pm and 9pm (two different shows) at Midnight Special Bookstore, 1450 2nd St. in Santa Monica, CA. 310-393-2923. Free Admission.

PXL THIS 13 highlights include:

Past PXL THIS favorite Joe Gibbons tries to quash Barbie's romance with young beau Ken in THE STEPFATHER.
Eli Elliott's ASSCROFT highlights the absurdities of the US Attorney General.
Eight-year-old Juniper Woodbury offers a detailed lesson ABOUT FLOWERS, and the poignant MARKER. Berkeley poet Walter Liggett gets energized in POETRY WORKSHOP.
John Humphrey's PEE WEE GOES TO PRISON explodes the myth of American justice through the window of Pee Wee's Playhouse.
Michael Possert's SPECIAL REPORT is an urgent take on the state of the world, from the not-so-distant future. Tedi Tate & Eliot Fons' HORSE utilizes Pixelvision's unique close-up capabilities to survey ghostly and mythological equine details.
Dahvi Bolog's HIPPIES USE SIDE DOOR takes military recruiting to the top level.
Joe Golling's DOWNTOWN ODYSSEY documents a young man's reaction to urban chaos.
Dwight Swanson's VICTIM chronicles the philosophical quest of Amy Fisher and her journey from malls to madness.
Jason Britski's MOVING VIOLATION examines the textures, rhythm and beauty that resides hidden within a community.
Robert Dobbs reswindles Menippean memory with new punctuation, the DOUBLE-DUTY INTERROBANG.
Eli Elliott's BURNT POPCORN mixes mainstream culture with avant-garde mediums.
A cop chases down four outlaws trying to escape to Mexico in Luci Wesphal-Solary's music video OUTSIDE THE LAW.
Chuck Perry's MEAT THE JOHNSONS is the funny story of suburban zombie and his wife.
Ross Craig's PXL MANIFESTO is a spoof on dogma filmmaking. Steve Craig's NEO-CON HYBRIDS concerns alien abductions.
Steve Rose's SOUVENIR reveals a darkly mysterious world which exists within a souvenir snow globe. & Stacy Craft's FAMILIAR explores the amorphous and dependency ridden space that is created by chronic illness.
Nicholas Zeltzer's ROOMMATEY AGAIN: THE STRANGE CASE OF THE GAY PIRATE PENGUIN is a Joycean tale of a stuffed animal. & Joe Frese's LAWN STATUES is a surrealistic dark comedy about an ex-con whose life takes an unexpected turn.

Also works by Pixelators Kyzer Mckinn, Martin Smith, Elric Kane. Jason Bickford, Doug Ing and the Ernie Kovacs of Pixelvision, Denny Moynahan.

25- THE SIMPLICITY OF FACELESSNESS - Kyzer McKinn, 4m
26- OUTSIDE THE LAW - Luci Westphal-Solary, 3m
27- ROOMATEY AGAIN: The Strange Case of the Gay Pirate Penguin - Nicholas Zeltzer, 9m
28- MEAT THE JOHNSONS - Chuck Perry, 6m
29- LAWN STATUES - Joe Frese, 19m

Clap Off They Glass is always acceptimg entries for future PXL THIS festivals. For info send SASE: PXL 2427 ½ Glyndon Av, Venice, CA,90291, 310-306-7330. Much thanks to everyone who helps. Vidiots(310-392-8508) rents PXL THIS compilations & will screen PXL THIS 13on Feb 20, 2004. Visit: www.indiespace.com/pxlthis
Contact: Gerry Fialka 310-306-7330

PXL THIS 13, the annual festival featuring videos made with the PXL 2000 toy camera, will premiere on Saturday, NOV. 15 2003 at 7pm and 9pm (two different shows) at Midnight Special Bookstore, 1450 2nd St. in Santa Monica, CA. 310-393-2923. Free Admission. Visit:www.indiespace.com/pxlthis

PXL THIS 13 highlights include: Past PXL THIS favorite Joe Gibbons tries to quash Barbie’s romance with young beau Ken in THE STEPFATHER. Eli Elliott’s ASSCROFT highlights the absurdities of the US Attorney General. Eight-year-old Juniper Woodbury offers a detailed lesson ABOUT FLOWERS, and the poignant MARKER. Berkeley poet Walter Liggett gets energized in POETRY WORKSHOP. John Humphrey’s PEE WEE GOES TO PRISON explodes the myth of American justice through the window of Pee Wee’s Playhouse. Michael Possert’s SPECIAL REPORT is an urgent take on the state of the world, from the not-so-distant future. Tedi Tate & Eliot Fons’ HORSE utilizes Pixelvision’s unique close-up capabilities to survey ghostly and mythological equine details. Dahvi Bolog’s HIPPIES USE SIDE DOOR takes military recruiting to the top level. Joe Golling’s DOWNTOWN ODYSSEY documents a young man’s reaction to urban chaos. Dwight Swanson’s VICTIM chronicles the philosophical quest of Amy Fisher and her journey from malls to madness. Jason Britski’s MOVING VIOLATION examines the textures, rhythm and beauty that resides hidden within a community. Robert Dobbs reswindles Menippean memory with new punctuation, the DOUBLE-DUTY INTERROBANG. Eli Elliott’s BURNT POPCORN mixes mainstream culture with avant-garde mediums. A cop chases down four outlaws trying to escape to Mexico in Luci Wesphal-Solary’s music video OUTSIDE THE LAW. Chuck Perry’s MEAT THE JOHNSONS is the funny story of suburban zombie and his wife. Ross Craig's PXL MANIFESTO is a spoof on dogma filmmaking. Steve Craig's NEO-CON HYBRIDS concerns alien abductions. Steve Rose's SOUVENIR reveals a darkly mysterious world which exists within a souvenir snow globe. Stacy Craft’s FAMILIAR explores the amorphous and dependency ridden space that is created by chronic illness. Nicholas Zeltzer’s ROOMMATEY AGAIN: THE STRANGE CASE OF THE GAY PIRATE PENGUIN is a Joycean tale of a stuffed animal. Joe Frese’s LAWN STATUES is a surrealistic dark comedy about an ex-con whose life takes an unexpected turn. Also works by Pixelators Kyzer Mckinn, Martin Smith, Elric Kane. Jason Bickford, Doug Ing and the Ernie Kovac’s of Pixelvision, Denny Moynahan.

The PXL-2000 toy camera, made in the late 80's by Fisher-Price, records sound and image directly onto audio cassettes. This failed toy continues to empower artists. RES magazine praised PXL THIS as a welcome highlight in the Los Angeles media scene celebrating the rich lexicon available in a tool which might seem rather limiting.

Film Threat's Chris Gore declares PXL THIS as one of the top ten video festivals.

All the PXL THIS videos reflect festival organizer Gerry Fialka's commitment to the freedom produced by making art without financial constraints.
-Holly Willis.

PXL THIS videos are admired for their characteristic spontaneity, highly personal perspective, visual uninhibitedness and raw, grainy truths.
-LA Weekly.

Gerry Fialka's PXL THIS festival snaps, crackles and pops off the screen with the funky, user-friendly energy of real first-person cinema. Goofy, gorgeous, and altogether groovy, his provocative program of pieces produced with the Fisher-Price PXL 2000 toy video camera is not only downright entertaining, but more, its blipping and buzzing black and white picture-bits coalesce into a veritable inspiration to all those who cherish the playful, spontaneous gestures and low-cost of electronic folk art.
-Craig Baldwin

The PXL-2000 toy camera, made in the late 80's by Fisher-Price, records sound and image directly onto audio cassettes. This failed toy continues to empower artists. RES magazine praised PXL THIS as “a welcome highlight in the Los Angeles media scene celebrating the rich lexicon available in a tool which might seem rather limiting.” Film Threat’s Chris Gore declares PXL THIS as one of the top ten video festivals. “All the PXL THIS videos reflect festival organizer Gerry Fialka’s commitment to the freedom produced by making art without financial constraints.”-Holly Willis. “PXL THIS videos are admired for their characteristic spontaneity, highly personal perspective, visual uninhibitedness and raw, grainy truths.”-LA Weekly. “Gerry Fialka’s PXL THIS festival snaps, crackles and pops off the screen with the funky, user-friendly energy of real first-person cinema. Goofy, gorgeous, and altogether groovy, his provocative program of pieces produced with the Fisher-Price PXL 2000 toy video camera is not only downright entertaining, but more, its blipping and buzzing black’n’white picture-bits coalesce into a veritable inspiration to all those who cherish the playful, spontaneous gestures and low-cost of electronic folk art.” -Craig Baldwin

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."

PXL THIS 14 (2004)

2011-02-14T09:37:00.000-08:00

PXL THIS 14 premiered Nov 20, 2004, 7 DUDLEY CINEMA, Venice CA
7:00pm
1- FISH, FRUITS & NUTS - Denny Moynahan, 6 minutes
2- MY MAGIC EIGHTBALL - Juniper Woodbury, 4m
3- PXL PINATA - Michael Possert, 5m
4- STRINGWORK - Ellen Lake, 3m
5- RUG RAT - Lisa Marr, 6m
6- OUTER RINGS - Gerry Fialka, 7m
7- WALTER MURCH BLINKS & SAVES US -Elric Kane & Adam Gould, 4m
8- FLY GIRL - Kelly Jones, 4m
9- BOBBY'S FRIENDS - Tim Finchum, 3m
10- SHE WAS - C. Gallo, 2m *
11- MJ DONG - Eli Elliott, 3m
12- FISH - Joe Frese, 5m
13- BORN IN LOVE - Alfred Johnson, 4m
14- GIRL YAWNING - Elric Kane, 6m
15- WONDER - Paolo Davanzo, 6m
16- SERRF - Kelly Jones, 7m
17- TV - Doug Ing, 5m
18- GIOSPOT - Giovanni Natale, 2m
19- RAW - Carlo Biela, 9m
20- STUFFED WITH LEAVES - Jamie Cohen, 3m
21- NOSFERATU - Tim Finchum, 7m *
22- BABBLEFESTO - Ross Craig, 4m

9:00pm
23- ZERO - Eli Elliott, 15m
24- BABBLEFESTO TWO - Steve Craig, 4m
25- NIGHT - Elric Kane, 8m *
26- INFORMATION RETRIEVAL - Paul Bacca, 3m
27- COAL MINER'S GRANDDAUGHTER - Cecilia Dougherty, 80m *

Those followed with * will be shown in future screenings if time permits.

PXL THIS 14 also screened at OtherCinema.com in San Fran on April 23, 2005 at 8:30pm

A PXL segment aired on G4TV.com

Read about Pixelvision in the new article in MIT's TECHNOLOGY REVIEW http://www.technologyreview.com/articles/04/11/wo_jenkins110904.asp

PXL THIS 14 screened on THURSDAY, May 26, 2005 at 8:00pm at EchoParkFilm Center.org

Gerry Fialka spoke on Pixelvision at the Comparative Media Studies colloquium at MIT, Room 2-105, on Thursday, March 3, 2005 . PXL THIS 13 screened on March 3 at 7:30pm in room 2-105 on MIT campus. More about Comparative Media Studies at MIT: http://web.mit.edu/cms/

7 DUDLEY CINEMA screened the world premiere of PXL THIS 14, the 14th annual toy video festival, on Saturday, November 20, 2004 - two different shows: 7:00pm and 9:00pm at SPONTO GALLERY, 7 Dudley Ave, Venice, CA, 310-306-7330, free admission, Visit: www.indiespace.com/pxlthis and www.81x.com/7dudley/cinema
The responsive full house responded with cinematic enlightenment.

PXL THIS 14 highlights include:
Last year's favorite Juniper Woodbury, now nine-years-old, returns with the delightful MY MAGIC EIGHTBALL. Super songwriter Alfred Johnson sings about the triumphs of being BORN IN LOVE. Jamie Cohen's STUFFED WITH LEAVES uncovers our politicians' doings. Ellen Lake's STRINGWORK documents Graciela Carrillo's beautiful embroidery. King Kukulele takes Pixelvision interactivity to dynamic dimensions in FISH, FRUITS & NUTS. Giovanni Natale remembers his boyhood heroes in GIOSPOT. A six-year-old with her bat opens a very special PXL PINATA by Michael Possert. Eli Elliott's side-splitting funny MJ DONG celebrates fellow motorists' vanity and sense of character. Kelly Jones gives us a tour of her garbage plant Terminal Island workplace in SERRF, and portrays a hip talk show host in FLY GIRL. Poet/politician Robert Dobbs explores what human sensorium is extended by the PXL 2000 camera in OUTER RINGS. Carlo Biela's political documentary RAW looks at peace, Bush & the media during the largest international day of protests in history, Feb 15, 2003. Lisa Marr's RUG RAT unveils the greed ridden acquisition of American Indian textiles. Paolo Davanzo's WONDER honors his relationship with a faithful traveling companion. Joe Frese's poignant FISH dives into underwater thoughts. Doug Ing's TV reveals its services and disservices. Tim Finchum evocatively takes advantage of Pixelvision unique close-up capability in BOBBY'S FRIEND. Elric Kane's WALTER MURCH BLINKS & SAVES US discusses the philosophies of film editing. Kane's GIRL YAWNING recalls Bresson's "ejaculatory force of the eye" viewing live web cam sites. Paul Bacca yelps provocative INFORMATION RETRIEVAL. Ross Craig contributes the hilarious self-reflexive minimalist masterpiece BABBLEFESTO. Steve Craig's BABBLEFESTO #2 combines automated customer service messages and structuralist cinema. Eli Elliott's ZERO deeply probes a farcical appointment with his self-exploring comic self. Cecilia Dougherty's epic melodrama, COAL MINER'S GRANDDAUGHTER is an experimental narrative conceptually based on the idea of documenting family life.


In the LA WEEKLY, Feb 18, 2005, film editor Ron Stringer praised PXL THIS 14:
"In this reprise of the latest selection of short subjects (27 in all) from the eccentric and somewhat inbred coterie of filmmakers dedicated to making art with their Fisher-Price PXL-2000 toy cameras, at least
two of the films seem especially suited to that perversely low-res medium. In Lisa Marr's RUGRAT, a meditation on William Randolph Hearst's passionate, if short-lived, interest in Navajo weaving as the signature motif for his retreat at San Simeon, the fragmentation inflicted by the PXL process on the geometric patterning of the Indian blankets serves nicely as a metaphor for the fickle newspaper mogul's wandering field of attention. Then, in Elric Kane's NIGHT, as lovers at the end of an affair struggle to decide which of their personal reminiscences shall be canonical, their efforts are reflected in the difficulty we may have buying into the degraded PXL images as an adequate reflection of reality. Also noteworthy: the Craig brothers' BABBLEFESTO ONE and TWO, both of which pack one hell of a kick into their four-minute length, and Juniper Woodbury's MY MAGIC EIGHTBALL, an investigative documentary in which the PXL-2000 camera finds its way back into the hands of the consumers for which it was originally intended."

Established in 1991, Clap Off They Glass Productions supports independent video-making by sponsoring the annual PXL THIS Festival, which is the oldest of its kind in the world. Even with no corporate sponsors, no color brochures, no big shot movie director board members, no ticketmaster access, PXL THIS has been featured on PBS, IFC and NPR. RES magazine praised PXL THIS as "a welcome highlight in the Los Angeles media scene celebrating the rich lexicon available in a tool which might initially seem rather limiting." PXL THIS spans many genres: documentary, poetry, drama, art, music, political activism, cinema povera, comedy and the avant-garde. The unique Fisher-Price toy camcorder PXL 2000, which records sound and image directly onto audio cassettes, continues to empower artists. This failed toy was only made in the US from 1987 to 1989. The magical PXL 2000 restores a certain humanity to the overpowering technology of video. "PXL is the ultimate people's video." - J. Hoberman, Premiere Magazine.

"All the PXL THIS videos reflect festival organizer Gerry Fialka's commitment to the freedom produced by making art without financial constraints." - Holly Willis, LA Reader.

"In past years, PXL THIS gave us some fascinating work...definitely an out-there experience. In the last few years, PXL videos have made it to such hallowed domains as the Whitney Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, Sundance, and the London Film Festival, where they have been admired for their characteristic spontaneity, highly personal perspective, visual uninhibitedness and raw, grainy truths." - Mary Beth Crain, LA Weekly.

"PXL THIS is worthy of praise...spellbinding. The shifting bricks of light and dark that form the Fisher-Price PXL 2000's picture lend themselves well to personal essays, creating an invigorating mesh of ambiguity and intimacy in every frame." - Paul Malcolm, LA Weekly.

Film programmers and curators - please be aware that many different PXL THIS programs (90 to 120 minutes each) are available for rent by contacting Gerry Fialka, phone 310-306-7330 or pfsuzy@aol.com
Programs include BEST OF PXL THIS (the first 10 years), PXL THIS TEN, PXL THIS ELEVEN and PXL THIS 13 (on DVD, read praise from The LA TIMES and SF WEEKLY in the Blackboard interview with Fialka on the Articles page). In the past, they have screened successfully in San Fran-OtherCinema.com, the Ann Arbor Film Festival, Echo Park Film Center, New York-rbmc.net, Vancouver-blindinglight.com, Irvine,CA, Austin,TX, Albq., NM, Jacksonville, FL, Seattle, Eugene and Portland,OR. These are truly dynamic shows of low-tech video folk art that can draw big crowds

The new DVD entitled THE ART OF PIXELVISION is currently available from www.precious-realm.com

NEW! - link to articles about Pixelvision

PXL THIS was declared one of the ten BEST VIDEO FILM FESTIVALS by CHRIS GORE in his book "The Ultimate Film Festival Survival Guide."

Gerry Fialka offers various workshops on Pixelvision and more. Click here for information...

We are now accepting entries for PXL THIS Festivals! See below...

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 first-class postage stamps with each entry.

Hey! you can send email now...just use elienation@hotmail.com, Continue to feel free to write or call.

PXL THIS 15 (2005)

2011-02-14T09:35:00.001-08:00

PXL THIS 15, the 15th annual film festival featuring the Fisher Price PXL 2000 toy video camera premieres Saturday, Nov 19, 2 different shows 7 & 9pm at Sponto Gallery, 7 Dudley Ave, Venice, 310-306-7330, free admission. For more info, please visit: www.indiespace.com/pxlthis and www.81x.com/7dudley/cinema

PXL THIS 15 has the most entries to be shown ever. Highlights include: Terrence Handscomb's THE REVELATION/THE PASSION ACCORDING TO ANDREI inverts the hypocrisy of American militarism by examining the Abu Ghraib political torture issues as if Tarkovsky was into noir beefcake. Maverick music pioneer John Trubee's KAREN'S NODULES digs deep into the psyche. Poet Rich Ferguson rantchants ON BECOMING AN URBAN LEGEND about an event that could happen to anyone! Two more startling revelations from seminal Pixelators Steve Craig (MY BROTHER DOESN'T KNOW) and Ross Craig (THE LAST PXL MOVIE). Jared Busch's SEVENTH IRIS DARK finds a young man's PXL 2000 recording harrowing images of its subjects' pasts. Bart Ezra Plaskoff's GURUDEV explores humility, love, materialism and the human condition by revealing that a homeless man is actually a God-Realized Guru engaging in his final meditation. Julie Fabulous' OUR MONKEY FRIENDS rocks out sock monkeys to Lene Lovich's "Monkey Talk." Robert Dobbs' TV AIN'T NO TACTILE probes McLuhan's dangerous TV breakthrough via the cloning esp and morphic resonance of Salvador Dali's 1968 TV Guide cover. Tahmus Rounds' THE MAN IN THE WATER finds a man, faced with the consequences of a life unattended, escaping to the place that has always given him comfort - the sea.

Michael Possert's HELEN POSSERT: A WWII ROSIE recalls a real life "Rosie the Riveter." Paul Richley's ORSO NERO DI CESANO engages PXL's unique psychcerebral storytelling capacities with a deer and a dog. Richley's SPING traverses the textures of color. Jason Britski's TORTURED BY SIDEWALKS captures the striking landscape of Peggy's Cove, Nova Scotia. Bryan Konefsky's BEAUTIFUL DREAMER views an unsuspecting passenger on a cruise ship in Vancouver, BC as he becomes the object of the filmmaker's desire. I'M IN THE MOOD is Konefsky's colorful portrait of the Ann Arbor, Michigan legendary street performer Shaky Jake, as he serenades pedestrians. Adam Gould's THE EIFFEL TOWER WILL NEVER SEE ITSELF is a personal investigation into the reality of the recorded moving image and the reality of the filmmaker's own existence. Gould's RESEMBLANCE is a meditation on the dissonance between individuality and family ties. Kelly Jones' TEN MOVEMENTS AMERICA slices up "live free or die" Americana while visiting her grandmother. Eli Elliott's ONE is the third film in a trilogy of figuring out one's farcical self. Elric Kane's INNER BEAUTY CONTEST exposes the over saturation of seductive online imagery, and his PRECIPITINS blends archival footage and PXL to make for this ceremony like expulsion of the fears that hold back a man from opening himself up to the woman who loves him. Dahvi Bologh's THE CELLULAR PHONE uncovers the hidden effects of this current dominant invention. Geoff Seelinger's funny yet tragic SECRET RECIPE takes a look at a day working with a friend at his "Mc-job," as a Kentucky Fried Chicken manager. Doug Ing's MONICA is the touching story of a love affair. John Humphrey offers two PXL punch lines: PSA#1 & LUNAR EXPRESSO. Lisa Marr & Paolo Davanzo's THE YEAR OF TRANSFORMATION cultivates the here and now. Joe Frese swings STRING BASSES & CELLOS. Denny Moynahan, the Ernie Kovacs of Pixelvision, delivers another interactive gem.

"All the PXL THIS videos reflect festival organizer Gerry Fialka's commitment to the freedom produced by making art without financial constraints. PXL THIS is a welcome highlight in the Los Angeles media scene celebrating the rich lexicon available in a tool which might initially seem rather limiting."
- Holly Willis, editor of RES magazine.

"The irresistible irony of the PXL is that the camera's ease-of-use and affordability, which entirely democratizes movie-making, has inspired the creation of some of the most visionary, avant and luminous film of our time." -Steve Schneider, New York Times. "PXL is the ultimate people's video."
- J. Hoberman, Premiere Magazine

"Gerry Fialka's PXL THIS festival snaps, crackles and pops off the screen with the funky, user-friendly energy of real first-person cinema. Goofy, gorgeous, and altogether groovy, his provocative program of pieces produced with the Fisher-Price PXL 2000 toy video camera is not only downright entertaining, but more, its blipping and buzzing black 'n' white picture-bits coalesce into a veritable inspiration to all those who cherish the playful, spontaneous gestures and low-cost of electronic folk art."
-Craig Baldwin.

Established in 1991, Clap Off They Glass Productions supports independent video-making by sponsoring the annual PXL THIS Festival, which is the oldest of its kind in the world. Even with no corporate sponsors, no color brochures, no big shot movie director board members, no ticketmaster access, PXL THIS has been featured on PBS, IFC and NPR, and most recently screened at MIT. PXL THIS spans many genres: documentary, poetry, drama, art, music, political activism, cinema povera, comedy and the avant-garde. The unique Fisher-Price toy camcorder PXL 2000, which records sound and image directly onto audio cassettes, continues to empower artists. This failed toy was only made in the US from 1987 to 1989. The magical PXL 2000 restores a certain humanity to the overpowering technology of video.

Films featured in past PXL THIS festivals are archived and available for viewing at the Academy Film Archive in Hollywood. For viewing appointments and information, please call (310) 247-3016 x 387, or visit the archive's web site at www.oscars.org/filmarchive .

"In past years, PXL THIS gave us some fascinating work...definitely an out-there experience. In the last few years, PXL videos have made it to such hallowed domains as the Whitney Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, Sundance, and the London Film Festival, where they have been admired for their characteristic spontaneity, highly personal perspective, visual uninhibitedness and raw, grainy truths." - Mary Beth Crain, LA Weekly.

"PXL THIS is worthy of praise...spellbinding. The shifting bricks of light and dark that form the Fisher-Price PXL 2000's picture lend themselves well to personal essays, creating an invigorating mesh of ambiguity and intimacy in every frame." - Paul Malcolm, LA Weekly.

"Since the start of the 21st century, I've attended the annual screenings of the PXL THIS toy camera festival at San Francisco's OTHER CINEMA. I have discovered several patterns of Pixelators that are similar to the pioneering video artists of the 60's. One, they reclaim film as a one-person project. Contrary to the popular belief that filmmaking must be collaborative, the solo vision is dominant and documented here. Two, in PXL-land, personal and deeply individualistic issues - frequently in the form of confessionals - are dominant. Pixelvision forms a quiet sub-genre within the larger category of the 'personal essay' film, an intimate art-world of privacy, whose entries frequently resemble message-in-a-bottle intimacies. These patterns show that expanding the vocabulary of moving image art is still possible - and, indeed, is growing." -Steve Polta, San Francisco Cinematheque curator.

In spirit, the PXL-2000 toy camera resembles the cheap throwaway still camera, known as the Holga. Writing in ESQUIRE, Joshua Liberson called the Holga: "The world's most unserious serious camera...the Holga takes strangely beautiful, dreamlike pictures. Its two-part interlocking design allows liight to bleed through constantly from the sides, making it almost impossible to take a boring picture, regardless of the subject matter."

"Most exciting art movements have been reactions against technical sophistication. Many have gone 'backwards' to find honesty and truth, the essence of things." - Guy Maddin

PXL THIS 15, 11-19-05, Sponto Gallery, Venice CA
7:00pm
1- KING KUKULELE QUAD - Paul Bacca, 5 minutes
2- GURUDEV - Bart Ezra Plaskoff, 8m
3- STRING BASSES & CELLOS - Joe Frese, 1m
4- ONE - Eli Elliott, 12m
5- THE REVELATION/THE PASSION ACCORDING TO ANDREI - Terrence Handscomb, 6m
6- BEAUTIFUL DREAMER - Bryan Konefsky, 3m
7- TORTURED BY SIDEWALKS - Jason Britski, 2m
8- TEN MOVEMENTS AMERICA - Kelly Jones - 7m
9- PSA#1 - John Humphrey, 1m
10- LUNAR EXPRESSO - John Humphrey, 1m
11- THE MAN IN THE WATER - Tahmus Rounds, 13m
12- MONICA - Doug Ing, 1m
13- MY BROTHER DOESN'T KNOW - Steve Craig, 3m
14- OUR MONKEY FRIENDS - Julie Fabulous, 3m
15- THE LAST PXL MOVIE - Ross Craig, 3m
16- SECRET RECIPE - Geoff Seelinger, 13m

9:00pm
17- ON BECOMING AN URBAN LEGEND - Rich Ferguson, 7m
18- HELEN POSSERT: A WWII ROSIE - Michael Possert, 6m
19- THE EIFFEL TOWER WILL NEVER SEE ITSELF - Adam Gould, 11m
20- RESEMBLANCE - Adam Gould, 4m
21- TV AIN'T NO TACTILE - Gerry Fialka, 15m
22- THE YEAR OF TRANSFORMATION - Lisa Marr & Paolo Davanzo, 5m
23- ORSO NERO DI CESANO - Paul Richley, 7m
24- VR MIRRORS FZ - Suzy Williams, 3m
25- SPING - Paul Richley, 3m
26- INNERVU - Paul Richley, 1m
27- BELLZ - Paul Richley, 2m
28- THE CELLULAR PHONE - Dahvi Bologh, 5m
29- I'M IN THE MOOD - Bryan Konefsky, 5m
30- SEVENTH IRIS DARK - Jared Busch, 15m
31- INNER BEAUTY CONTEST - Elric Kane, 4m
32- PRECIPITINS - Elric Kane, 4m
33- KAREN'S NODULES - John Trubee, 4m

PXL THIS 16 (2006)

2011-02-14T09:33:00.000-08:00

PXL THIS film
festival - Established in 1991 and celebrating the Fisher-Price PXL 2000
toy video camera. We are now accepting entries for PXL THIS 17:
deadline for entry Sept 22, 2007. It premieres in Venice CA at 7 Dudley
Cinema on Nov 17, 2007 visit

www.81x.com/7dudley/cinema
We now accept entries on DVD. Send one DVD copy to Gerry Fialka 2427 1/2
Glyndon Av, Venice CA 90291 and another copy to:

DOUG ING, 1522 Alewa Drive, Honolulu, HI 96817 douging@aol.com 808-371-6845
Doug's preferred formats: 1) A quicktime movie miniDV codec burned to
either a CD ROM for those under 4 minutes or a DVD ROM for films under
20 minutes. (Note this isn't DVD but DVD ROM). 2) MiniDV tape- tapes
will be returned (do not send masters & send him return postage,
please). 3) DVD. Doug has started the Vidster festival: VIDSTER THIS -
contact him for more info.

PXL THIS
film festival director Gerry Fialka hoicks up PXL at the 45^th
Ann Arbor Film Festival

aafilmfest.org and conducts the ANN ARBOR FILM FEST PIONEERS
workshop.

Visit the workshops page. He'll be doing the interactive workshop
"PIXELVISION:Electronic Folk Art" on March 17, 2007 at 2pm at the Flint
Institute of Arts, who'll also being showing "The Best of PXL THIS" in
the FIA Fleckenstein Video Gallery from March 6 - April1, visit:

www.flintarts.org

PXL THIS 16, the 16th annual film festival featuring the Fisher
Price PXL 2000 toy video camera premiered Saturday, Nov 18, 2006
with 2 different shows 7 & 9pm at Sponto Gallery, 7 Dudley Ave,
Venice, 310-306-7330, free admission. The audience really
appreciated entries from all across the world. The Feb 15, 2007
VIDIOTS

www.vidiotsvideo.com (they rent all past festivals
exclusively)screening takes place in Santa Monica at 8pm. PXL THIS
16 also screens in San Fran on May 12, 2007 at

othercinema.com and in LA on May 24 at

echoparkfilmcenter.org

The * indicates that it will be on the tour as time permits.

PXL THIS 16 - Sponto Gallery,
Venice CA - Saturday, Nov 18, 2006

7pm show:

1- KID KUKULELE - Denny Moynahan, 5 minutes*
2- ROUSHAM - Matt Honeyball, 5m*
3- ALIENS - Michael Almereyda, 13m*
4- GESTURES - L.M. Sabo, 2m*
5- A PRACTICAL MYSTIC - Gerry Fialka, 8m*
6- A STATE OFEXTREME UNWINDING - Will Erokan, 5m*
7- CONSCIOUSNESS OF MASS CONSTRUCTION - Theresa Hulme, 4m*

8- WON'T COME DOWN - Gabriel Van Jones, 4m *
9- WORDS - Hillary Kaye, 1m*
10- NEWSPAPER - Doug Ing, 5m*
11- IMAGINARY LANDSCAPES - Kelly Jones, 5m*

12- TOO BUSY - Glenn Abbott, 4m*
13- THE HOMECOMING - Gavin Maitland, 4m*

14- UFOLOGY - George Willis, 10m

9:00pm show:

15- BURNT POPCORN 2 - Eli Elliott, 10m*
16- FORM CONSTANT - Will Erokan, 10m*
17- KLEZMER MUSIC - Ron Grun, 2m*

18- DARKNESS AS THE LIGHT - Hillary Kaye, 2m*
19- EMPATH - Robert Dobbs, 8m*
20- REMEMBER THE GOOD OLD DAYS - John Trubee, 2m *

21- SOMNIGRAPHIC TRACES OF THE OTHERWISE UNDOCUMENTED FRIEDKIN INSTITUTE FOR SLEEP DISORDER RESEARCH - Struan Ashby & Roy Parkhurst, 15m*
22-COLD STORAGE VS. TOKYO BOWL-Lisa Marr & Paolo Davanzo-TheHere&Now, 3m*

23-THE END OFCARLTON LUBOFF - Charles Chadwick, 20m

24- HOW TO MAKE A YOUTUBE VIDEO THAT IS NOT A YOUTUBE VIDEO - Gerry
Fialka, 7m youtube.com http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VSN4aX-YIEQ#GU5U2spHI_4
25- CIRCUMFLEXUOUS - Paul Bacca, 5m*

"PXL THIS 16 represents Fialka’sdedication to showcasing unheard
voices and supporting a trulydemocratic art form" - HollyWillis, LA Weekly 11-16-06

PXL THIS 16 highlightsinclude: A chronology of thewar in Iraq is told inGESTURES, a provocative film by L. M. Sabo (press ready stills at http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/photos.html).

PXL THIS goes international once again with the UK entry ROUSHAM by Matt Honeyball (press ready stills at http://www.welcometohell.co.uk/rousham/), who utilizes Pixelvision's dream-like gaze to explore the edifices and dark corners of one of England's most striking countryside domiciles.

Culture Jammer John Trubee makes the subtleties obvious
in REMEMBER THE GOOD OLD DAYS.
Will Erokan's A STATE OF EXTREME UNWINDING utilizes the more grainy noise of audio cassette Pixelvision to create a rockin' rhythmic
experiment.
Ron Grun's touching KLEZMER MUSIC celebrates Jewish soul music.
Glen Abbott's TOO BUSY deconstructs the axiom "what comes around, goes around and around and around."
PXL pioneer Doug Ing contributes THE NEWSPAPER as read and written.
Gerry Fialka's A PRACTICAL MYSTIC studies the effects of Korla Pandit's visionary music on teenagers.
From New Zealand, Struan Ashby & Roy Parkhurst's SOMNIGRAPHIC TRACES OF THE OTHERWISE UNDOCUMENTED FRIEDKIN INSTITUTE FOR SLEEP DISORDER RESEARCH delves deep into the neuro-psychological dream research of Dr. Vorlicek's Somnigraph.
Lisa Marr & Paolo Davanzo-The Here & Now's COLD STORAGE VS. TOKYO BOWL survey the mysterious delights of modern day velocipede clubs in downtown LA.
EMPATH by Robert Dobbs illuminates the cosmic para-awareness of the flight
bulb.
Hillary Kaye's DARKNESS AS THE LIGHT impacts the viewer with political poetry and painted imagery. Agitprop Pixelator
Eli Elliott's BURNT POPCORN 2 sabotages the PXL THIS fest with the newest kids video camera and gut-wrenching hilarity.
Theresa Hulme's CONSCIOUSNESS OF MASS CONSTRUCTION invites a pulsation of soul-transformation.
From Nova Scotia, Canada, Gavin Maitland's THE HOMECOMING reflects on a young woman returning to her childhood home and the strange relationship with her younger brother.
Denny Moynahan, the Ernie Kovacs of PXL, remote controls his baby daughter in the funny interactive gem KID KUKULELE.
Paul Bacca's CIRCUMFLEXUOUS takes on bike antics.
Michael Almereyda's ALIENS is a portrait of two brothers playing a video game while talking about their favorite movies.

"PXL THIS is something that has to be seen and experienced at least once in a lifetime."
-Santa Monica Mirror

PXL THIS 16 reviews and articles:

http://www.laweekly.com/film+tv/short-run/pxl-this-16/15029/

http://www.santamonicaargonaut.com/articles/2006/11/16/entertainment/wo3.txt

http://www.fylmz.com/editorial/article_43.html

"Gerry Fialka's PXL THIS festival snaps, crackles and pops off the screen with the funky, user-friendly energy of real first-person cinema. Goofy, gorgeous, and altogether groovy, his provocative program of pieces produced with the Fisher-Price PXL 2000 toy video camera is not only downright entertaining, but more, its blipping and buzzing black 'n' white picture-bits coalesce into a veritable inspiration to all those who cherish the playful, spontaneous gestures and low-cost of electronic folk art."
-CraigBaldwin.

Established in 1991,Clap Off The Glass Productions supports independent video-making by sponsoring the annual PXL THIS Festival, which is the oldest of its kind in the world. Even with no corporate sponsors, no color brochures, no big shot movie director board members, no ticketmaster access, PXL THIS has been featured on PBS, IFC and NPR, and most recently screened at MIT. PXL THIS spans many genres: documentary, poetry, drama, art, music, political activism, cinema povera, comedy and the avant-garde. The unique Fisher-Price toy camcorder PXL 2000, which records sound and image directly onto audio cassettes, continues to empower artists. This failed toy was only made in the US from 1987 to 1989. The magical PXL 2000 restores a certain humanity to the overpowering technology of video. The irresistible irony of the PXL is that the camera's ease-of-use and affordability, which entirely democratizes movie-making, has inspired the creation of some of the most visionary, avant and luminous film of our time.

Films featured in past PXL THIS festivals are archived and available for viewing at the Academy Film Archive in Hollywood. For viewing appointments and information, please call (310) 247-3016 x 387, or visit the archive's web site at www.oscars.org/filmarchive.
"In past years, PXL THIS gave us some fascinating work...definitely an out-there experience. In the last few years, PXL videos have made it to such hallowed domains as the Whitney Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, Sundance, and the London Film Festival, where they have been admired for their characteristic spontaneity, highly personal perspective, visual uninhibitedness and raw, grainy truths."

- Mary Beth Crain, LA Weekly.

"PXL THIS is worthy of praise...spellbinding. The shifting bricks of light and dark that form the Fisher-Price PXL 2000's picture lend themselves well to personal essays, creating an invigorating mesh of ambiguity and intimacy in every frame." - Paul Malcolm, LA Weekly.
"Since the start of the 21st century, I've attended the annual screenings of the PXL THIS toy camera festival at San Francisco's OTHER CINEMA. I have discovered several patterns of Pixelators that are similar to the pioneering video artists of the 60's. One, they reclaim film as a one-person project. Contrary to the popular belief that filmmaking must be collaborative, the solo vision is dominant and documented here. Two, in PXL-land, personal and deeply individualistic issues - frequently in the form of confessionals - are dominant. Pixelvision forms a quiet sub-genre within the larger category of the 'personal essay' film, an intimate art-world of privacy, whose entries frequently resemble message-in-a-bottle intimacies. These patterns show that expanding the vocabulary of moving image art is still possible - and, indeed, is growing."

-Steve Polta, San Francisco Cinematheque curator.

Film programmers and curators - please be aware that many different PXL THIS programs (90 to 120 minutes each) are available for exhibition by contacting Gerry Fialka, phone 310-306-7330 or pfsuzy@aol.com
Programs include BEST OF PXL THIS, PXL THIS 10, 11, 12, 13 (on DVD, read praise from The LA TIMES and SF WEEKLY in the Blackboard interview with Fialka on the Articles page), 14, 15, 16, etc. In the past, they have screened successfully in San Fran at www.OtherCinema.com, the Ann Arbor Film Festival, Echo Park Film Center www.echoparkfilmcenter.org, New York-rbmc.net, Vancouver-blindinglight.com, Irvine,CA, Austin,TX, Albq., NM, Jacksonville, FL, Seattle, Eugene and Portland,OR. These are truly dynamic shows of low-tech video folk art that can draw big crowds

The DVD entitled THE ART OF PIXELVISION came from www.precious-realm.com

PXL THIS was declared one of the ten BEST VIDEO FILM FESTIVALS by CHRIS GORE in his book "The Ultimate Film Festival Survival Guide."

Gerry Fialka offers various workshops on Pixelvision and more.

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 DVD and/or 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 first-class postage stamps with
each entry.

Email PXL THIS at pfsuzy@aol.com or elienation@hotmail.com Continue to feel free to write or call.

RELATED LINKS

www.bentstruments.com contact: PATRICK, the PXL repair man
www.81x.com/7dudley/press - LA Press contacts
www.81X.com/7dudley/cinema - Venice Beach - cutting edge film series
www.myspace.com/sevendudleycinema - Documental film series at The Unurban Coffeehouse, 3301 Pico Blvd, Santa Monica CA 90404, 310-315-0056
http://elvis.rowan.edu/~cassidy/pixel/ for more about the PXL 2000
http://www.jesgrew.org/wake/ for the Marshall McLuhan/Finnegans Wake Reading Club, moderated by Gerry Fialka
http://www.wnyc.org/arts/articles/1423 - wnyc-studio 360 radio show on PXL (Saturday, July 6th show)
Pixel Pix Picks article onothercinema.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.

PXL THIS 17 (2007)

2011-02-14T09:10:00.003-08:00

PXL THIS 17, the 17th annual Fisher Price toy camera film festival, premiered at Sponto Gallery on Nov 17, 2007 with two different shows www.myspace.com/sevendudleycinema at 7 Dudley Ave, Venice, 310-306-7330, free admission. The audience really appreciated the entries. Our Pixelators ranged in age from 4 to 54, and came from New Zealand, UK, Canada and across the US. PXL THIS 17 also screened at:
**Unurban Cafe in Santa Monica on Feb 18'08
**Other Cinema in SF on Sat, May 24 '08 at 8:30pm at ATA, 992 Valencia St, San Fran, CA 94110, 415-648-0654, othercinema.com, admission is $6,
**Echo Park Film Center on May 22 '08

In 2007, the PXL 2000 celebrated its 20th year as a tool used by both the underground and Hollywood. The inventor James Wickstead is available for interviews at phone:973-267-2007 jwda@wicksteaddesign.com

PXL THIS 17 - Nov 17, 2007, Sponto Gallery, Venice CA
7pm
1- PRINCESS KUKULELE - Denny Moynahan, 5 mintues
2- UNICORNY IN PREHISTORIC TIMES - Madeline Whitney, 2m
3- NO. 5 - Sean Solomon, 3m
4- THE LIVELY DOLLS - Juniper Woodbury, 3m
5- BODY SHOP - Donovan Seelinger, 3m
6- GEARSTORY - Donovan Seelinger, 2m
7- A TOOL IS A TOOL - Geoff Seelinger, 3m
8- BURSTING IN AIR - L.M. Sabo, 2m
9- MICHAEL POSSERT - A WWII SOLDIER - Michael Possert Jr, 12m
10- UTOPIA - Solomon Turner & MX Farina, 8m
11- VOL.9 NO.120 SATURDAY, MARCH 17, 2007 - Clint Enns, 4m
12- WITH THE EDGE OF MY HAND - Rizorkestra, 4m
13- ME, JILLY & THE CHAIRMAN - Joe Nucci, 9m
14- TUNGSTEN 74 FT. KIM BRANDT - "RUSTY CAVALIER (2)" - Rudy Abrams - 5m
15- DER HIMMEL UBER KALIFORNIEN - Terrence Handscomb, 13m
16- REALITYSHIFT - Will Erokan & Ian Sonnemann, 3m
17- THE ASTROBUNNY TRANSMISSIONS - Chad Dunnack, 22m

9pm (Viewer Discretion Advised for #18 & 19)
18- THE DISASSEMBLY LINE - Robert Sexton, 10m
19- FUN GUN - Audie Harrison, 4m
20- WITH THIS KISS - Rich Ferguson, 4m
21- SOULGASM - Theresa Hulme, 4m
22- OH SOPHIE - Rizorkestra, 2m
23- FROM CLICHE 2 ARCHETYPE - Steve DeGroodt, 3m
24- UNTITLED - Sean Solomon, 6m
25- REMEMBER TO FORGET? - Gerry Fialka, 8m
26- CATACLYSM - L.M. Sabo, 4m
27- THE STORY OF WHAT HAPPENED WHEN RUDY CAME HOME
EARLY FROM WORK & CAUGHT JACK IN A COMPROMISING
POSITION - Jason Margolis, 5m
28- THEY WERE ONLY NUMBERS - Freya, 4m
29- HAMMOND'S ARCANA, OR THE PARADISE OF BIRDS- Roy Parkhurst & Struan Ashby, 8m
30- COOKING - Doug Ing, 10m
31- COME OVER - David Self, 3m
32- KING LIQUOR - Lisa Marr & Paolo Davanzo - 6m
33- GUITAR DISCARNATE - Michael Dunnigan & Rod Poole, 23m
34- CAT GOES SPLAT & THE STORY OF POLKA - ZZalgernO, 8m
35- MINNEY - Paul Bacca, 5m

PXL THIS 17 highlights include:

Roy Parkhurst & Struan Ashby's HAMMOND'S ARCANA, OR THE PARADISE OF BIRDS, from New Zealand, is a metaphysical satire on technological speed-up and ornithological imaginary solutions. This experimental narrative presents a pataphysical probe into identity crisis and cultural discourses, speculatively crossing William Blake and the Reverend Howard Finster. Email R.R.Parkhurst@massey.ac.nz for stills and press kit.

The youngest Pixelator ever Donovan Seelinger (4 years old) divulges GEARSTORY. http://fooie.com/donovanPXLVideos

Terrence Handscomb's DER HIMMEL UBER KALIFORNIEN is a sardonic critique of Californian culture tropes - a fascination with the body, cosmetic surgery and the prolongation of youth, science-fiction mysticism and the suspension of death. He stirs them into a thick mix of low resolution Hollywood-Noir stylistics. Watch it at www.terrence.org and stills at http://www.terrence.org/der_himmel/press/

L. M. Sabo's cinema verite CATACLYSM captures a bustling metropolis suddenly engulfed in catastrophic violence. Press ready stills at http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/CATACLYSM-Stills.html

Audie Harrison's FUN GUN is a silly little game of murder and mayhem. Press ready stills at www.audieharrison.com/fungunstills. Watch it at www.audieharrison.com/fungun.

Preteen Juniper Woodbury gets shaking in THE LIVELY DOLLS.

Geoff Seelinger's A TOOL IS A TOOL plays a little game with light and time on a Brooklyn bike ride. http://fooie.com/atool

From Canada, Jason Margolis' THE STORY OF WHAT HAPPENED WHEN RUDY CAME HOME EARLY FROM WORK & CAUGHT JACK IN A COMPROMISING POSITION utilizes naughty puppets in intense drama.

Michael Possert Jr's MICHAEL POSSERT - A WWII SOLDIER captures his Dad's recollections of being wounded and arriving at Nordhausen concentration camp. Press ready stills- http://www.flickr.com/photos/2007pxl/

Solomon Turner & MX Farina's UTOPIA captures Venice Boardwalk performer "The Snakeman" rapping transcendental righteousness.

Theresa Hulme's SOULGASM transverses high consciousness.

Joe Nucci recalls his revealing encounter with Frank Sinatra in ME, JILLY & THE CHAIRMAN.

Gerry Fialka's REMEMBER TO FORGET? expands the function of remembering as not the opposite of forgetting.

Freya's THEY WERE ONLY NUMBERS is an abstract film that operates in the margins of ambiguity. A haunting soundtrack steadily and persistently builds and fades. Images in motion suggest that a wider canvas has been fragmented and is struggling to be seen. From the UK. Press ready still http://freya.atspace.com/images.html

Will Erokan & Ian Sonnemann's REALITYSHIFT finds suburban youth discussing authority and shamanism.

Michael Dunnigan & Rod Poole's GUITAR DISCARNATE fuses microtonal experimentations and Hendrixy Frippatronics to create an unforgettable sonic landscape.

Torn from the pages of redacted documents and secret CIA training manuals, Robert Sexton's unnerving THE DISASSEMBLY LINE relays a vision of controlled depravity. It is a nightmarish journey behind the scenes of government mind control where the innocent are broken and their souls are forever cracked. Based on factual events. MATURE AUDIENCES - VIEWER DISCRETION STRONGLY ADVISED. Watch it & stills http://hollywoodasylum.com/theline.html & ttp://project4studios.com/sexton/disassembly_web.mov

"PXL THIS 17...Surprising beauty...In Geoff Seelinger’s lovely video A Tool Is a Tool, a wrench suspended in front of a camera attached to a roving bicycle renders a cubist cityscape. Realityshift, by Will Erokan and Ian Sonnemann, marries a nonstop (and annoying) monologue about perceptions of the world to fast-cut, high-contrast images of a city to create a chaotic vision of contemporary consciousness. Mono-monikered director Freya’s strangely compelling They Were Only Numbers features a series of brief shots of green-tinged abstracted planes, folds and textures that pulse and shift in time to undulations of sound. It’s a simple but powerful piece, as is L.M. Sabo’s Cataclysm, in which images of what looks like a model city become eerily timeless in the gray murk of the camera’s trademark grit. Fialka deserves credit for his unflagging belief in the potential of the PXL camera to render something amazing" - Holly Willis, LA Weekly.

http://www.laweekly.com/film+tv/short-run/pxl-this-17-the-bad-and-the-beautiful/17698/

http://www.calendarlive.com/movies/cl-gd-moviescandy15pxlnov15,0,1824835.story?coll=cl-movies

"PXL THIS is something that has to be seen and experienced at least once in a lifetime." -Santa Monica Mirror

"All the PXL THIS videos reflect festival organizer Gerry Fialka's commitment to the freedom produced by making art without financial constraints. PXL THIS is a welcome highlight in the Los Angeles media scene celebrating the rich lexicon available in a tool which might initially seem rather limiting. PXL THIS represents Fialka’s dedication to showcasing unheard voices and supporting a truly democratic art form" - Holly Willis, LA Weekly.

"PXL is the ultimate people's video." - J. Hoberman, Premiere Magazine

"Gerry Fialka's PXL THIS festival snaps, crackles and pops off the screen with the funky, user-friendly energy of real first-person cinema. Goofy, gorgeous, and altogether groovy, his provocative program of pieces produced with the Fisher-Price PXL 2000 toy video camera is not only downright entertaining, but more, its blipping and buzzing black 'n' white picture-bits coalesce into a veritable inspiration to all those who cherish the playful, spontaneous gestures and low-cost of electronic folk art." -Craig Baldwin.

Established in 1991, Clap Off They Glass Productions supports independent do-it-yourself video-making by sponsoring the annual PXL THIS Festival, which is the oldest of its kind in the world. Even with no corporate sponsors, no color brochures, no big shot movie director board members, no ticketmaster access, PXL THIS has been featured on PBS, IFC and NPR, and most recently screened at MIT. PXL THIS spans many genres: documentary, poetry, drama, art, music, political activism, cinema povera, comedy and the avant-garde. The unique Fisher-Price toy camcorder PXL 2000, which records sound and image directly onto audio cassettes, continues to empower artists. This failed toy was only made in the US from 1987 to 1989. The magical PXL 2000 restores a certain humanity to the overpowering technology of video. The irresistible irony of the PXL is that the camera's ease-of-use and affordability, which entirely democratizes movie-making, has inspired the creation of some of the most visionary, avant and luminous film of our time.

Films featured in past PXL THIS festivals are archived and available for viewing at the Academy Film Archive in Hollywood. For viewing appointments and information, please call (310) 247-3016 x 387, or visit the archive's web site at www.oscars.org/filmarchive.

"In past years, PXL THIS gave us some fascinating work...definitely an out-there experience. In the last few years, PXL videos have made it to such hallowed domains as the Whitney Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, Sundance, and the London Film Festival, where they have been admired for their characteristic spontaneity, highly personal perspective, visual uninhibitedness and raw, grainy truths." - Mary Beth Crain, LA Weekly.

"PXL THIS is worthy of praise...spellbinding. The shifting bricks of light and dark that form the Fisher-Price PXL 2000's picture lend themselves well to personal essays, creating an invigorating mesh of ambiguity and intimacy in every frame." - Paul Malcolm, LA Weekly.

"Since the start of the 21st century, I've attended the annual screenings of the PXL THIS toy camera festival at San Francisco's OTHER CINEMA. I have discovered several patterns of Pixelators that are similar to the pioneering video artists of the 60's. One, they reclaim film as a one-person project. Contrary to the popular belief that filmmaking must be collaborative, the solo vision is dominant and documented here. Two, in PXL-land, personal and deeply individualistic issues - frequently in the form of confessionals - are dominant. Pixelvision forms a quiet sub-genre within the larger category of the 'personal essay' film, an intimate art-world of privacy, whose entries frequently resemble message-in-a-bottle intimacies. These patterns show that expanding the vocabulary of moving image art is still possible - and, indeed, is growing." -Steve Polta, San Francisco Cinematheque curator.

According to filmmaker Bryan Konefsky: "Pixelvision is the haiku of cinema: the minimum of means delivering the maximum of meaning. The PXL 2000 toy camera's limited image-quality forces moviemakers to focus on essentials, and thereby to produce a richly connotative cinematic experience. In fact, PXL may be the best instantiation of Stan Brakhage's luminous quote: 'The true meaning of cinema can be found between the frames.'"

"In the spirit of Andy Warhol's experimental films, the PXL THIS Festival inspires independent artists to create, explore, and discover the magic of cinema. As a video gallery installation, these works were a curious and wonderful revelation to museum visitors." - Charles Gentry, Curator of Film & Video Art, Flint Institute Of Arts, screened The Best of PXL THIS from March 6-April 1, 2007.

In spirit, the PXL-2000 toy camera resembles the cheap throwaway still camera, known as the Holga. Writing in ESQUIRE, Joshua Liberson called the Holga: "The world's most unserious serious camera...the Holga takes strangely beautiful, dreamlike pictures. Its two-part interlocking design allows light to bleed through constantly from the sides, making it almost impossible to take a boring picture, regardless of the subject matter."

"Most exciting art movements have been reactions against technical sophistication. Many have gone 'backwards' to find honesty and truth, the essence of things." - Guy Maddin

Andrea Nina McCarthy's 2005 MIT thesis "Toying With Obsolescence: Pixelvision Filmmakers & The Fisher Price PXL 2000 Camera" is essential reading.

PXL NEWS:

BEST of PXL THIS 13-16 screens at the Mendocino Film Festival http://www.mendocinofilmfestival.org/ on 5-30-08 with a workshop, and at http://www.chicagofilmmakers.org/ 9-13-08.

WED, May 28. BEST of PXL THIS 13-16 (90m workshop & screening) from 4-7pm at UofO's Lawrence Hall #115 in Eugene, OR call Matt for details 503-957-1557 mnixon@uoregon.edu, pistolgripfilms@yahoo.com

Detroit Film Center detroitfilm.org presented the PIXELVISION: ELECTRONIC FOLK ART workshop and BEST OF PXL 13-16 (both available for bookings) on SAT, Aug 11'07 http://www.metrotimes.com/editorial/story.asp?id=11219

SF Cinematheque hosted the workshop and screening of BEST OF PXL 13-16 on Feb 10 '08 at Yerba Buena Arts Center http://www.sfcinematheque.org/calendar.shtml http://www.ybca.org/tickets/production.aspx?performanceNumber=4644

BEST of PXL THIS screened at http://www.antimatter.ws/ Sept 23, 2007. In March '07, Gerry Fialka lectured at the Ann Arbor Film Fest aafilmfest.org and on PXL at flintarts.org on March 17.

CALL FOR ENTIRES: We are now accepting entries for PXL THIS 18. Visit indiespace.com/pxlthis for details. Contact: Gerry Fialka 310-306-7330 pfsuzy@aol.com

20 YEARS OF PXL by Gerry Fialka
The 17th annual PXL THIS Film Festival is dedicated to Andrew Bergman and Tommy Heidt, both of whom have passed away. They helped inventor James Wickstead design the PXL 2000 toy video camcorder, which Fisher Price released from 1987 to 1989.

Artists pursue childlike innocence in the creative process. Starting off with a kids camera is a step towards achieving these youthful dreams. "Genius is childhood recalled at will." - Charles Bauderlaire. "Ask questions a child would ask." - Albert Einstein. Pixelators combine instinct and accident in producing astonishing films.

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. The festival celebrates a tool for making moving image art. Critic Amy Taubin wrote "Artists want to do things that break the rules of the mainstream. Just using this camera (the PXL2000) is breaking a kind of rule about what an image should look like." Jean Cocteau declared, "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." PXL THIS 17 brings together the latest work by past PXL masters and exciting new talents from near and far (New Zealand, UK, Canada) ranging in age from 4 (our youngest ever) to 59 years old.

"Much of the most exciting and important part about tomorrow is not the technology or the automation at all, but that man is going to come into entirely new relationships with his fellow men. He will retain much more in his everyday relations of what we term the naivete and idealism of the child. This will be completely justified and not exploited or exploitable in any way. I think then that the way to see what tomorrow is going to look like is just to look at our children." - Bucky Fuller.

In the NY Times article "Unblinking Eye, Visual Diary: Warhol’s Films," Manohla Dargis seems to be describing Pixelvision: "These home movies work short and dauntingly long, silent and sound, scripted and improvised, often in black and white, still as death and alive to its moment. Awkward, beautiful, raw, spellbinding, radical — they are films like few others, in part because, first and foremost, they are also sublime art....Warhol seems to grab hold of time and hold it still, capturing the moth moments before it fluttered too close to the flame....Warhol explained that Pop artists 'did images that anybody walking down Broadway could recognize in a split second — comics, picnic tables, men’s trousers, celebrities, shower curtains, refrigerators, Coke bottles — all the great modern things that the Abstract Expressionists tried so hard not to notice at all.'...Yet in Warhol’s films the illusions of Hollywood, with its seamless narratives and industrial imperatives, are self-consciously replaced by other illusions, notably those pertaining to identity."

In the Film Comment 9-07 article, Chris Chang writes: "Mike Kelley said 'an adolescent is a dysfunctional adult, and art is dysfunctional reality' and keeping with this line of thinking, an artist could be perceived as a permanent adolescent which is about as close to eternal life as anybody can ever get."

"Dig Infinity" proclaimed Lord Buckley, who has influenced PXL THIS. He subverted comedy from within, much like what PXL THIS has accomplished for 17 years. It is a genuine fake film festival with no entry fees, and no competition. PXL THIS deconstructs the post-post modern "tainted toy" and flips it into its opposite - recalling the Rodgers & Hart musical "Babes In Arms" as a template for kids, but really for adults.

"If you look too closely at the TV, all you see are dots." - Sarah Silverman.

PXL THIS 17 tour adds (if time permits) :
The Pixelators' Pixelator Paul Bacca's MINNEY and another King Kukulele interactive gem entitled BOOGER PATROL.

Lisa Marr & Paolo Davanzo's KING LIQUOR - A night in the life of Echo Park's notorious liquor store.

Clint Enns' VOL. 9 NO. 120 SATURDAY, MARCH 17, 2007 returns us to early years of experimental cinema by producing a contradiction; that is, a piece shot using only the red low-light warning of the PXL 2000 camcorder. Press ready still at http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f104/dogmatodisco/pxl2000/vol9no120-1.jpg

Ruby Abrams' TUNGSTEN 74 FT. KIM BRANDT - "RUSTY CAVALIER (2)" explores the dichotomy between physical victory and moral victory with dancer/sculptor Brandt.

Chad Dunnack inventories the effects of robotics in THE ASTROBUNNY TRANSMISSIONS, which involves a pile of TV sets and satellite dishes receiving random signals from a rabbit in outer space.

Rizorkestra's OH SOPHIE and WITH THE EDGE OF MY HAND rumbles junkyard blues with his rootsy one man band pluckin' a ruckus.

ZZalgernOn's CAT GOES SPLAT & THE STORY OF POLKA tells the colorful story of edgy entertainers.

PXL pioneer Doug Ing gets into the kitchen with COOKING.

Sixteen year old Sean Solomon & his band Moses Campbell sing passionate poetics in UNTITLED and NO. 5. Watch: ttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Nxc4Ploj4I and http://youtube.com/watch?v=SDlIklanbIQ

Wordpainter Rich Ferguson gets intimate WITH THIS KISS of affectionate tactility.

David Self's energetic rendition of COME OVER presents indie rockers Super Satellite with stunning shots of deliciously lo-fi and kinetically infused rhythmic mayhem.

Steve DeGroodt's FROM CLICHE 2 ARCHETYPE gets knee deep in media ecology swamp muck.

L.M. Sabo's BURSTING IN AIR sets a spectacular display of fireworks to ripping guitar of the Star Spangled Banner (press ready stills at http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/bursting-in-air-Stills.html ).

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New PXL THIS 16 reviews and articles:

http://www.mlive.com/entertainment/fljournal/index.ssf?/base/features-0/1174053183116110.xml&coll=5

http://www.santamonicaargonaut.com/articles/2006/11/16/entertainment/wo3.txt

http://www.fylmz.com/editorial/article_43.html

http://www.calendarlive.com/printedition/calendar/cl-wk-screen15feb15,0,4186541.story?coll=cl-calendar

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NEW FIALKA WORKSHOPS:

1- WHO'S JAMMIN THE JAMMERS ? - Media ecologist Gerry Fialka (Bio-http://www.venicewake.org/About/About_Gerry.html) presents an interactive workshop and screening of films by subversive artists and pranksters who inflict brand damage to expose corporate manipulation of America's mediascape. Fialka probes Marshall McLuhan's Laws of Media in correlation with revolutionary artists (including Craig Baldwin, Barbie Liberation Organization, Rev. Billy - Church of Stop Shopping, Billboard Liberation Front, and Bob Dobbs) providing new critical perspectives with surprise, humor and the thrill of transgression. Join this agitprop examination of the motives and consequences of the jammer's collaboration with the jammee. When Sputnik went up fifty years ago, McLuhan upgraded the global village to the global theater, and we all became actors. Visit: www.venicewake.org

“A put-on is not necessarily a put-down. I liken what I do sometimes to a life game, as an adventure in absurdity, an adult fairytale in which I engage people emotionally and intellectually. The audience gets involved and has to decide for itself what’s going on and what’s to be learned from the experience. Everybody is a participant." - Alan Abel

JAM Z JAMMERZ: SEE, REAPPEAR & BREATHE (14 minutes, 2008) - As agitprop archaeologists, Mark X Farina & Gerry Fialka's provocative video probes how the 50's music/comedy icons John Cage (noise as music, side effects in silence), Korla Pandit (the Hammond Organ as drum, fake identity), Lenny Bruce (speech as jazz, grievance), Ernie Kovacs (visual effects as Surrealism, Menippean tactic of the "fourth wall") and Lord Buckley (narrative as living organism, elevation not put-down) laid the groundwork for contemporary culture jammers. They reinvented Beckett's "Nothing is funnier than unhappiness," and Steve Allen's "Behind every joke there's a grievance."

Their reappearance offers new questions:
- Did the electric environment kill or save humanity?
- Did television renew the art museum?
- Why did James Joyce make TV the hidden ground in his 1939 book FINNEGANS WAKE?
- Can the banality of satellite-speed-up cause epiphanies?
- What have we forgotten about social amnesia?
- Who is jamming the jammers?

Rechanneling George Melies and Marcel Duchamp, JAM Z JAMMERS reinvigorates and mirrors how these visionaries elevated self-irony to uncover the ambiguity and complexity of ecstasy and numbness. "The audience is the employer." - Marshall McLuhan. "I find TV very educational. Every time someone turns on a set I go in the other room and read a book." - Groucho Marx. "When you are laughing, you're learning." - Robert Dobbs. "Satire is tragedy plus time" - Lenny Bruce.

MARK X FARINA is a Los Angeles based painter, filmmaker and biker, whose work has appeared in group shows with David Hockney and Ed Rushca. He received his BFA from Edinboro University of Pennsylvania, and now heads the Video Department at Otis College of Art and Design in LA. He is a practitioner of POP, Pro Punk, Neo Goo, and Reverse Engineering in Mixed Media Visual Arts.

GERRY FIALKA, artist, film curator, writer, lecturer, and paramedia ecologist has conducted interactive workshops from UCLA to MIT, from the Ann Arbor Film Festival to Culver City High School. Fialka gave two major lectures at The 2001 North America James Joyce Conference at UC Berkeley. The public interview series MESS (Media Ecology Soul Sessions) has featured Fialka in engaging conversations with the likes of Mike Kelley, Alexis Smith, Abraham Polonsky, Mary Woronov, Paul Krassner, Ann Magnuson, Heather Woodbury, Norman Klein, Chris Kraus, P. Adams Sitney, Hunter Drohojowska-Philp, Kristine McKenna, Ann Magnuson, John Sinclair, Grace Lee Boggs, and Firesign Theatre's Phil Proctor. Fialka's interviews have been published in books by Mike Kelley and Sylvere Lotringer.

"I have participated in Gerry Fialka's interactive workshops at the Ann Arbor Film Festivals in 2006 and 2007. He is willing to enter in new discussions even if they go against his current views. Fialka's multilayered delivery of ideas encourages the search for new questions and new paradigms that extend beyond. He is well-informed, off-beat and articulate - one of the most fascinating people I've met at the AAFF." - Keith Jeffries, Ascalon Films

"I am very impressed by Gerry Fialka's energy in bringing together groups of people to think about ideas. That is very much in the McLuhan spirit to create and foster interdisciplinary, living, educational projects in which people can talk about ideas. He creates forums that bring together a plurality of critical perspectives into one multivalent conversation. " - Janine Marchessault, author of MARSHAL McLUHAN: COSMIC MEDIA.

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2- FOUND FOOTAGE - Scavenger artist Gerry Fialka asks new questions about found art. This interactive workshop delves into Joseph Cornell, Bruce Conner, Emile de Antonio, and Dusan Makavejev. Do reconstructions and deconstructions create counter histories? Dumpster diving filmmakers (like past AAFF participants: Bruce Conner, Craig Baldwin, Jesse Lerner & more) recycle refuse to elevate the bastard medium of assemblage with aesthetic coherence. How and why does the hybrid film's metaphoric weight surpass its status as a visual document? Have all the films in the world been made and it's just a question of re-editing them?

3- FAKE DOCS - Media archaeologist Gerry Fialka explores the popularity of the mockumentary. Are they lying to tell the truth? Discussing Alexandra Juhasz & Jessie Lerner's book F IS FOR PHONY: Fake Documentray And Truth's Undoing, Fialka probes the fiction/documentary divide, the ethics of reality-based manipulation, and whether documentaries derive from form or reception. From Bunuel's Land Without Bread to Welles's F is For Fake to Reiner's Spinal Tap to Craig Baldwin's faux faux Tribulation 99, fakes dismantle understandings of identity, history, authenticity and authority.

4- GRASSROOTS 9/11 FILMMAKERS - Self taught filmmakers & political activists are asking the questions that corporate media avoids. Their compelling investigative research is reaching millions via the Internet, community & at-home screenings. Filmmaker/political activist Gerry Fialka probes the phenomenon of ZEITGEIST and screens exclusive interviews with the independent filmmakers of LOOSE CHANGE, 9/11 MYSTERIES and more. This interactive discussion explores the motives and consequences of bottom-up filmmaking movements, revolutionary change, copyright free ("open sources") and movie-watching's subliminal effects.

5- YOUTUBE: DEMOCRATIZING FILMMAKING - Media Ecologist Gerry Fialka traces the history of low-tech creativity from Super 8mm & Pixelvision to cellphone videos, ipods, new media to come, and the latest global cultural phenomenon, YouTube. Online social networking sites are rapidly making accessible everything from experimental film to war atrocities, from rare music performances to influential political clips, and from user-generated content to censored shows. Explore the hidden effects of this vital tool as an active means of democratizing self expression 24/7. Fialka will probe McLuhan's "rearviewmirrorism" (when new media looks backwards for content and meaning) and how we experience the multilayered blending of high & low cultures.

6- DOCUMENTARY DILEMAS - Film Curator Gerry Fialka leads an interactive workshop on the documentary film and its recent rise of popularity. Examining pioneers like Flaherty, Vertov, Wiseman, Pennebaker, Michael Moore, Herzog and Chris Marker, this review will incite new questions about Grierson's definition of documentary as "creative treatment of actuality." Probing the philosophies of documentarians, fresh insights will arise concerning stagings and reenactments, and the different viewpoints on degrees of involvement with the subjects. Vertov argued for presenting "life as it is" (that is, life filmed surreptitiously) and "life caught unawares" (life provoked or surprised by the camera). What is endemic to this genre and why? Is Perception reality?

Review questions facing documentarians and their quest for ecstatic truth, emotional truth, intellectual truth and physical truth. How do they deal with personal bias, morals, and ethics in rewriting memory? If the filmmakers are faced with a life-or-death situation with the subject, should they put down the camera and attempt to save the life? What is the story, and then, what is the "real" story? Fialka offers diverse evaluations of how we perceive the world via documentaries, and challenging perspectives on Herzog's Grizzly Man, Morris' Fog of War, Eric Steel's The Bridge, the early hybrid masterpiece by Gillo Pontecorvo, The Battle Of Algiers, and the faux faux doc Tribulation 99 by Craig Baldwin.

"The most important thing a documentary director does is to say 'Stop shooting'" -Peter Davis. "The best fiction is more true than any kind of journalism." -Faulkner. "In order to make fiction, you have to begin with documentary, and in order to make documentary, you start with fiction." -Godard. "We are led to believe a lie, When we see not through the eye." - William Blake.

PXL THIS 18 (2008)

2011-02-14T09:09:00.000-08:00

Contact: Gerry Fialka 310-306-7330 pfsuzy@aol.com

PXL THIS 18, the 18th annual Fisher Price toy camera film festival:
May 2 at http://www.oddballfilm.com in sf
May 21 at http://www.echoparkfilmcenter.org in LA
"The highlight of PXL This 18, the annual showcase of short videos made using the Fisher Price PXL Vision toy camera, is The Trimorphic Hypotheses, a 17-minute sci-fi landscape mystery created in spectacular "PXL-RAMA," described as "a devolutionary breakthrough in analog postproduction, turning the crisp, high-definition video of today’s best technology into the coarse, low-resolution of yesterday’s lost artistry." The result is a split-screen, black-and-white pseudostory about a scientist who wanders a barren landscape, analyzing and measuring the Earth, using a souped-up metal detector and other wacky devices. Made by New Zealand filmmakers Struan Ashby and Roy Parkhurst, this captivating video spoofs B movies from the ’50s and ’60s while crafting an allegory about the attempt to parse nature’s my steries with technology. It’s main charms, however, are masterful visual choreography across the three simultaneous frames and perfect sound design incorporating The Ventures’ eerie but rocking "Twilight Zone." The Trimorphic Hypotheses captures a core aspect of PXL Vision ethos, namely ethe need to return to the basics of cinema to find its power. Other notable entries in this year’s survey include Lisa Marr and Paolo Davanzo’s The Fruit of Love, which mixes some colorful graphics and suitably distressed PXL Vision footage to explain the history of the banana in the U.S., and Geoff and Gwyneth Seelinger’s Birdly, a combination of home movie and motion study in which a flying bird at one point disintegrates into 8-bit graphic chunks, its fluttering motion offering the only clue to its identity. Clint Enn’s An Exploration of Digital Representation offers up meditative, pulsing imagery, with vertical lines and bursts of white light to craft a quick, abstract visual treat, while Joe Nucci’s Me, Terrence and the Boss chronicles a humorous escapade in the life of a limo driver, the camera holding on the driver’s animated face throughout. The show, as always, was curated by Venice- based artist Gerry Fialk a, and is a broad, varied mix of material reflecting Fialka’s overarching agenda: like glorious PXL-RAMA, Fialka seems to yearn for the low-res in art — and in life — and its ability to spark clarity despite, or because of, reduced visibility." - Holly Willis, LA Weekly
http://www.myspace.com/sevendudleycinema

PXL in LA WEEKLY http://www.laweekly.com/2009-03-05/film-tv/the-kids-stay-in-the-pxl/
http://www.laweekly.com/events/documental-478204/

This year's entries come from New Zealand, Canada, Czech Republic and across the US. Festival Director Fialka was in New Zealand with the PXL THIS festival in Nov'08 http://www.blowfestival.co.nz /
PXL THIS 18 highlights include:

With biting wit, L.M. Sabo's MINISTRY OF OIL songfully asks new petro questions. Links for stills:
http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/Ministry-of-Oil-3.jpg
http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/Ministry-of-Oil-1.jpg
http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/Ministry-of-Oil -2.jpg
http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/Ministry-of-Oil-3.jpg
http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/Ministry-of-Oil-4.jpg
http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/Ministry-of-Oil-5.jpg
From Canada, Clint Enns' AN EXPLORATION INTO DIGITAL REPRESENTATION renders how pure ligh t is interpreted by the PXL-2000. Press ready stills at -http://i4 6.photobucket.com/albums/f104/dogmatodisco/edr1.jpg
http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f104/dogmatodisco/edr2.jpg
http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f104/dogmatodisco/edr3.jpg

Will Erokan's I'M NOT BEER reconstructs Todd Haynes' Bob Dylan film with Robert Dobbs channeling five satellite conductors (including Arthur Kroker & William Irwin Thompson) unveiling the hidden effects of the news humming celebrity culture.

Geoff Seelinger's BIRDLY takes flight with otherworldly imagery.

Donovan Seelinger's WATERY CAMERA self-reflexcively enters the PXL lense through the eyes of a=2 0frisky four year old.

From New Zealand, Ashby & Parkhurst's ludic and quizzical THE TRIMORPHIC HYPOTHESES imagines what might have been like if Teshigahara had directed an episode of Lost In Space. They have developed a process of de-digitizing video using the amazing PXLvision Reduction™20system, a devolutionary breakthrough in analog post-production, turning the crisp, high-definition video of today's best technology into the coarse, low-resolution of yesterday's lost artistry. Press kit and stills available upon request from r.r.parkhurst@massey.ac.nz and s.r.ashby@massey.ac.nz and at http://erewhonfilms.blogspot.com/

Lisa Marr & Paolo Davanzo teach history and playfully entertain in the lively THE FRUIT OF LOVE.

William Rees & JoEllen Martinson's TAPE ELEVEN artfully combines fashion and PXL. http://candyeyefactory.com/tapeeleven.php

Chris Bentley's FOOM-GODZILLA VS COMMUNISM rocks out with Boston's Foom. www.cbimage.com/foom_still.jpg
From the Czech Republic, Michael Koshkin's DOES THIS LOOK SEXUAL? follows the transformation from prey to predator of a guy who happens to be at the wrong place at the right time. Edited in Prague, this Chicago Post-Neorealist film stars three experimental Chicago poets. The film also includes music by indie folk artist, Peter and the Wolf. Stills are available here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/33312927@N04/sets/72157611135613157/

Mr. TV's POSTCARD FROM HELL features ex-Saint of the Church of the SubGenius Janor Hypercleats as a slick street puppeteer conning pinks. Mr. TV's SELECTION '08 finds Venice Boardwalk performer Janor Hypercleats (contributor to The Book Of The Subgenius ) exposing political corruption.(stillsavailable upon request from Ned Sloan ichabod999@earthlink.net)

A PXL THIS first, a found pxl audio cassette RACING CAR revs around the track.

Author George Russell contributes SCREEN SHADOW, a disquisition on creativity through membranous int er connectivity.

Guitar avatar Edward LaGrossa' s ONE GOD unifies.

Jerron Paxton's UNTITLED BLUES returns to bare bones music making.=2 0

Gerry Fialka's REMAKE THE SUBTLETIES OBVIOUS? uncovers how the low definition of dada photography creates high involvement. Bio-http://www.venicewake.org/About/About_Gerry.html and a still with Gerry & PXL camera http://www.laughtears.com/

Atton Paul's APPROACHING STARS ventures into celestial meditation.

Jo e Nucci's ME, TERRENCE AND THE BOSS is the second in a trilogy of colorful limo driver recollections.

Experimental pioneer Douglas Katelus HEY BABY challenges the viewer with nervous system stimuli.

Preteen Juniper Woodbury's BIG BAD WOLF merges a classic with spontaneous storytelling.

Doug Ing's MAIL ART reveals the doings of postal paste-u ps.

Inspired 18 year old Sunny War astounds with punk-folk guitar picking and enthralling lyrics in FREE LOVE.

Denny Moynahan, as King Kukulel e, interacts with his filmic self in the soothing KING'S HAWAIIAN LULLABY.

"Gerry Fialka's PXL THIS festival snaps, crackles and pops off the screen with the funky, user-friendly en ergy of real first-person cinema. Goofy, gorgeous, and altogether groovy, his provocative program of pieces produced with the Fisher-Price PXL 2000 toy video camera is not only downright entertaining, but more, its blipping and buzzing b lack 'n' white picture-bits coalesce into a veritable inspiration to all those who cherish the playful, spontaneous gestures and low-cost of electronic folk art. " -Craig Baldwin

"PXL THIS...Surprising beauty...Fialka deserves credit for his unflagging belief in the potential of the PXL camera to render something amazing. All the PXL THIS videos reflect festival organizer Gerry Fialka's commitment to the freedom produced by making art without financial constraints. PXL THIS is a welco me highlight in the Los Angeles media scene celebrating the rich lexicon available in a tool which might initially seem rather limiting. PXL THIS represents Fialka’s20dedication to showcasing unheard voices and supporting a truly democratic art form" - Holly Willis, LA Weekly.
http://www.laweekly.com/film+tv/short-run/pxl-this-17-the-bad-and-the-beautiful/17698/
"PXL THIS is something that has to be seen and experienced at least once in a lifetime ." -Santa Monica Mirror

"PXL is the ultimate people's video." - J. Hoberman, Premiere Mag azine

"Gerry Fialka's enthusiasm for Pixelvision movie-making is incredibly contagious, and he's an absolute pleasure to work with." - Ed Carter, Director (Lumen) www.lumen.org.uk

Establ ished in 1991, Clap Off They Glass Productions supports independent do-it-yourself video-making by sponsoring the annual PXL THIS Festival, which is the oldest of its kind in the world. The first ever genuine fake film festival prides itself with no corporate sponsors, no color brochures, no big shot movie director board members, no ticketmaster access and no competition. PXL THIS, featured on PBS, IFC and NPR, has screened at MIT and other major venues across the US. PXL THIS spans many genres: documentary, poetry, drama, art, music, political activism, cinema povera, comedy and the avant-garde. The unique Fisher-Pri ce toy camcorder PXL 2000, which records sound and image directly onto audio cassettes, continues to empower artists. This failed to y was only made in the US from 1987 to 1989. The magical PXL 2000 restores a certain humanity to the overpowering technology of video. The irresistible irony of the PXL is that the camera's ease-of-use and affordability, which entirely democratizes movie-making, has insp ired the creation of some of the most visionary, avant and luminous film of our time.
Films featured in past PXL THIS festivals are archived and available for viewing at the Academy Film Archive in Hollywood. For viewing appointme nts and informat lineion, please call (310) 247-3016 x 387, or visit the archive's web site at www.oscars.org/filmarchive.

"In past years, PXL THIS gave us some fascinating work...definitely an out-there experience.20In the last few years, PXL videos have made it to such h allowed domains as the Whitney Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, Sundance, and the London Film Festival, where they have been admired for their characteristic spontaneity, highly personal perspective, visual uninhibitedness and raw, grainy truths." - Mary Beth Crain, LA=2 0Weekly.

"PXL THIS is worthy of praise...spellbinding. The shifting bricks of light20and dark that form the Fisher-Price PXL 2000's picture lend themselves well to personal essays, creating an invigorating mesh of ambiguity and intimacy in every frame." - Paul Malcolm, LA Weekly.

"Since the start of the 21st century, I've attended the annual screenings of the PXL THIS toy camera festival at San Francisco's OTHER CINEMA. I have discovered several patterns of Pixelators that are similar to the pioneering video artists of the 60's. One, they reclaim film as a one-person project. Contrary to the popular belief that filmmaking must be collaborative, the solo vision is dominant and documented here. Two, in PXL-land, personal and deeply individualistic20issues - frequently in the form of confessionals - are dominant. Pixelvision forms a quiet sub-genre within the larger category of the 'personal ess ay' film, an inti mate art-world of privacy, whose entries frequently resemble message-in-a-bottle intimacies. These patterns show that expanding the vocabulary of moving image art is still possible - and, indeed, is growing." -Steve Polta, San Francisco Cinematheque curator.
According to filmmaker Bryan Konefsky: "Pixelvision is the haiku of cinema: the minimum of means delivering the maximum of meaning. The PXL2000 toy camera's limited image-quality forces moviemakers to focus on essentials, and thereby to produce a richly connotative cinema tic experience. In fact, PXL may be the be st instantiation of Stan Brakhage's lu minous quote: 'The true meaning of cinema can be found between the frames.'"

"In the spirit of Andy Warhol's experimental films, the PXL THIS Festival inspires independent artists to create, explore, and discover t he magic of cinema.& nbsp; As a video gallery installation, these works were a curious and wonderful revelation to museum visitors." - Charles Gentry, Curator of Film & Video Art, Flint Institute Of Arts, screenedThe Best of PXL THIS from March 6-April 1, 2007.

In spirit, the PXL-2000 toy camera resembles the cheap throwaway still camera, known as the Holga. Writing in ESQUIRE, Joshua Liberson called the Holga: "The world's most unserious serious camera...the Holga takes strangely beautiful, dreamlike pictures. Its two-part interlocking design allows light to bleed through constantly from the sides, making it almost impossible to take a boring picture, regardless of the subject matter."

"Most exciting art movements have been reactions against technical sophistication. Many have gone 'backwards' to find honesty and truth, the essence of things. " - Guy Maddin

Andrea Nina McCarthy's 2005 MIT thesis "Toying With Obsolescence: Pixelvision Filmmakers & The Fisher Price PXL 2000 Camera" is essential reading.
PXL NEWS:
PXL THIS 18 also screens a t the Unurban in Santa Monica 3-09-09, at Echo Park Film Center 5-14-09 & in San Fran TBA.

BEST of PXL THIS 13-16 screened at http://www.chicagofilmmakers.org/ 9-1 3-08. In England, LUMEN http://www.lumen.org.uk/ hosted Fialka's workshop/screening (in204 different towns) in Sept, 2008. He screens/lectu res on PXL in New Zealand in Nov'09 http://www.blowfestival.co.nz/
http://www.metro.co.uk/metrolife/article.html?The_best_plac e..._to_fully_appreciate_a_Fisher-Price_PXL-2000&in_article_id=328581&in_page_id=253ine
PIXELVISION: ELECTRONIC FOLK ART workshop and BEST20 OF PXL 13-16 (both available for bookings) screened at the Mendocino Film Festival http://www.mendocinofilmfestival.org/ on 5-30-08, at University of Oregon on 5-28-08, at Detroit Film Center detroitfilm.org on 8-11-07 http://www.metrotimes.com/editorial/story.asp?id=11219

SF Cinematheque hosted the workshop and screening of BEST OF PXL 13-16 on Feb 10 '08 at Yerba Buena Arts Center http://www.sfcinematheque.org/calendar.shtml http://www.ybca.org/tickets/production.aspx?performanceNumber=4644\fs24fs20

BEST of PXL THIS 13-16 screened at http://www .antimatter.ws/ Sept 23, 2007. In March '07, Gerry Fialka lectured at the Ann Arbor Film Fest aafilmfest.org and on PXL at flintarts.org on March 17 ..
CALL FOR ENTIRES: We are now accepting entries for PXL THIS 19. Visit indiespace.com/pxlthis for details. Contact: Gerry Fialka 310-306-7330 pfsuzy@aol.com

20 YEARS OF PXL by Gerry Fialka
The 17th annual PXL THIS Film Festival was dedicated to Andrew Bergman and Tommy Heidt, both of whom have passed away. They helped inventor James Wickstead (available for interviews at phone:973-267-2007 jwda@wicksteaddesign.com) design the PXL 2000 toy video camcorder, which Fisher Price released from 1987 to 1989.

Artists pursue childlike innocence in the creative process. Starting off with a kids camera is a step towards achieving these youthful=2 0dreams. " Genius is childhood recalled at will." - Charles Bauderlaire. "Ask questions a child would ask." - Albert Einstein. Pixelators combine instinct and accident in producing astonishing films.

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. The festival celebrates a tool for making moving image art. Critic Amy Taubi n wrote "Artists want to do things t hat break the rules of the mainstream. Just using this camera (the PXL2000) is breaking a kind of rule about what an image should look like." Jean Cocteau declared, "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." PXL THIS 17 brings together the latest work by past PXL masters and exciting new talents from near and far (New Zealand, UK, Canada) ranging in age from 4 (our youngest ever) to 59 years old.

"Much of the most exciting and important part about tomorrow is not the technology or the automation at all, but that man is going to come into entirely new relationships with his fellow men. He w ill retain much more in his everyday relations of what we term the naivete and idealism of the child. This will be completely justified and no t exploited=2 0or exploitable in any way. I think then that the way to see what tomorrow is going to look like is just to look at our children." - Bucky Fuller.

In the NY Times article "Unblinking Eye, Visual Diary: Warhol’s Films," Manohla Dargis seems to be describing Pixelvision: "These home movies work short and dauntingly long, silent and sound, scripted and improvised, often in black and white, still as death and alive t o its moment. Awkward, beautiful, raw, spellbinding, radical — they are films like few others, in part b eca use, first and foremost, they are also sublime art....Warhol seems to grab hold of time and hold it still, capturing the moth moments before it fluttered too close to the flame....Warhol explained that Pop artists 'did images that anybody walking down Broadway could recognize in a split second E2 comics, picnic tables, men’s trousers, celebrities, shower curtains, refrigerators, Coke bottles — all the great modern things that the Abstract Expressionists tried s o hard not to notice at all.'...Yet in Warhol’s films the illusions of Hollywood, with its seamless narrative s and industrial imperatives, are self-consciously replaced by other illusions, notably those pertain ing to identity."

In the Film Comment 9-07 article, Chris Chang writes: "Mike Kelley said 'an adolescent is a dysfunctional adult, and art is dysfunctional reality' and keeping with this line of thinking, an artist could be perceived as a permanent adoles cent which is about as close to eternal life as anybody can ever get."

"Dig Infinity" proclaimed Lord Buckley , who has influenced PXL THIS. He subverted comedy from within, much like=2 0what PXL THIS has accomplished for 17 years. It is a genuine fake film festival with no entry fees, and no competition. PXL THIS deconstructs the post-post modern "tainted toy" and flips it into its opposite - recalling the Rodgers & Hart musical "Babes In Arms" as a template for kids, but really for adults.

"If you look too closely at the TV, all you see are dots." - Sarah Silverman.
PXL THIS 18 tour dvd http://www.laughtears.com/

1- BIRDLY - Geoff Seelinger, 3minutes
2- MINISTRY OF OIL - L.M. Sabo, 7m
3- THE YET TO BE TITLED BLUES - Jerron Paxton, 4m
4- I'M NOT BEER - Will Erokan, 6m
5- THE FRUIT OF LOVE - Lisa Marr & Paolo Davanzo, 4m
6- APPROACHING STARS - Atton Paul, 3m
7- BIG BAD WOLF- Juniper Woodbury, 5 m
8- FREE LOVE - Sunny War, 3m
9- WATERY CAMERA - Donovan Seelinger, 2m
10- AN EXPLORATION INTO DIGITAL REPRESENTATION - Clint Enns, 2m
11- TAPE ELEVEN - William Rees & JoEllen Martinson, 4m
12- MAIL ART - Doug Ing, 2m
13- MR. TV's SELECTION '08 - Janor Hypercleats, 3m
14- FOOM-GODZILLA VS COMMUNISM - Chris Bentley, 4m
15- DOES THIS LOOK SEXUAL? - Michael Koshkin, 9m
16- REMAKE THE SUBTLETIES OBVIOUS? - Gerry Fialka, 4m
17- ONE GOD - Edward LaGrossa, 4m
18- SCREEN SHADOW - George Russell, 4m
19- HEY BABY - Douglas Katelus, 4m
20- WONDERSTRUCK - Paul Bacca, 3m
21- ME, TERRENCE AND THE BOSS - Joe Nucci, 7m
22- KING'S HAWAIIN LULLABY - Denny Moynahan, 5m
23- RACING CAR - Anonymous, 8m

(And on seperate DVD) THE TRIMORPHIC HYPOTHESES - Struan Ashby & Roy Parkhurst, 17m

***********************

PXL THIS 18 - Dec 6, 2008 - Sponto Gallery, Venice CA http://www.laughtears.com/

Live music 6-7pm:Sunny War
7pm
1- BIG BAD WOLF - Juniper Woodbury, 5 minutes
2- FREE LOVE - Sunny War, 3m
3- SCREEN SHADOW - George Russell, 4m
4- SMEAR THE LENS - Donovan Seelinger, 1m
5- WATERY CAMERA - Donovan Seelinger, 2m
6- CANNED ETE BALLS - Donovan Seelinger , 2m
7- BIRDLY - Geoff Seelinger, 3m
8- REMAKE T HE SUBTLETIES OBVIOUS? - Gerry Fialka, 4m
9- MINISTRY OF OIL - L.M. Sabo, 7m
10- ME, TERRENCE AND THE BOSS - Joe Nucci, 7m
11- THE YET TO BE TITLED BLUES - Jerron Paxton, 4m
12- ONE GOD - Edward LaGrossa, 3m
13- TAPE ELEVEN - William Rees & JoEllen Martinson, 4m
14- CHOOSE BLUES - Edward LaGrossa, 3m

9pm
15- KING'S HAWAIIN LULLABY - Denny Moynahan, 5m
16- THE FRUIT OF LOVE - Lisa Marr & Paolo Davanzo, 4m
17- THE TRIMORPHIC HYPOTHESES - Struan Ashby & Roy Parkhurst, 18m
18- PIXIE VISIONS - Steve Binder, 5m
19- I'M NOT BEER - Will Erokan, 6m
20- AN EXPLORATION INTO DIGITAL REPRESENTATION - Clint Enns, 2m
21- PXL PHIL - Douglas Katelus, 6m
22- HEY BABY - Douglas Katelus, 4m
23- APPROACHING STARS - Atton Paul, 4m
24- MAIL ART - Doug Ing, 2m
25- READING - Doug Ing, 5m
26- FOOM-GODZILLA VS COMMUNISM - Chris Bentley, 4m
27- DOES THIS LOOK SEXUAL? - Michael Koshkin, 9m
28- POSTCARD FROM HELL - Janor Hypercleats, 3m
29- MR. TV's SELECTION '08 - Janor Hypercleats, 3m
30- WONDERSTRUCK - Paul Bacca, 4m
31- RACING CAR - Anonymous, 8m HOME

PXL THIS 19 (2009)

2011-02-14T09:08:00.001-08:00

Contact: Gerry Fialka 310-306-7330pfsuzy@aol.com Visit: http://www.laughtears.com/ and http://pxlthis.ning.com

PXL THIS 19, the annual toy camera film festival, screens
Thursday, May 20, 2010 at 8pm at Echo Park FIlm Center, 1200 Alvarado St (at Sunset Blvd) LA CA 90026, 213-484-8846, admission $5 http://echoparkfilmcenter.org/
Sat, Oct 23 at 8:30pm at Other Cinema, 992 Valencia St (& 21st), San Fran CA 94110, 415-648-0654, admission $6 http://www.othercinema.com/

PXL THIS, featuring films made with the Fisher-Price PXL 2000 toy camcorder, is one of the longest running film festivals in the entertainment capital of the world. Celebrating "cinema povera" moving image art, it evokes Marcel Duchamp's axiom "Poor tools require better skills." Pixelators from across the globe hoick up inventive approaches to the unassuming throw-away of consumer culture. These low-tech hi-jinx films come through loud and clear by reframing a new cinema language. "If movies offer an escape from everyday life, Pixelvision is the Houdini of the film world." - SF Weekly
PXL THIS 20 celebrates two decades of Toy Camera Film Festing on Dec 13, 2010. Entry deadline Oct 22 - simply send a dvd to Gerry Fialka 2427 1/2 glyndon av, venice, ca 90291, 310-306-7330, pfsuzy@aol.com

"Gerry Fialka’s annual PXL THIS is a reliably surprising and seductive round-up of recent work achieved with the PXL 2000 camera. This humble outdated “toy” continues to bring out the visionary child in filmmakers and viewers alike, and no one has kept the PXL flame burning longer or brighter than Gerry." - Michael Almereyda, director
PXL THIS 19 press: http://www.argonautnewspaper.com/articles/2009/12/03/entertainment/wo1.txt and http://www.laweekly.com/events/pxl-this-779992/ and http://www.campuscircle.com/review.cfm?r=10020
PXL THIS 19 highlights include:

PXL-2000 Inventor James jwda@wicksteaddesign.com Wickstead's COLOR PXL is the world premiere of the only footage ever shot with this one-of-a-kind PXL-2000 color camcorder. (see Wickstead's essay below)

L.M. Sabo's I PUSH ON captures an individual's personal protest against big oil through simply cutting their lawn every week with a push reel mower. Press ready stills:
http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/I-Push-On-1.jpg
http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/I-Push-On-2.jpg
http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/I-Push-On-3.jpg
http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/I-Push-On-4.jpg

Clint Enns' THE AESTHETICS OF FAILURE, from Canada, is simultaneously about his inability to interact with party people as well as the PXLcam's inability to properly interpret the going-ons. Press ready stills
http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f104/dogmatodisco/TheAestheticsofFailure1.jpg
http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f104/dogmatodisco/TheAestheticsofFailure2.jpg

Michael Possert Jr's SOUTHWEST MUSEUM 2009 RECAP - The Autry National Center is burning a lot of donor money to crush the Los Angeles community that wants to keep the Southwest Museum alive and well. Friends of the Southwest Museum Coalition spokesperson - Nicole Possert - gives a clear overview of the contentious merger issues. Press ready stills:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/2007pxl/4089654335/sizes/o/in/set-72157622645002779/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/2007pxl/4089653633/sizes/o/in/set-72157622645002779/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/2007pxl/4090417128/sizes/o/in/set-72157622645002779/

Chris Bentley's THE WANDERING ERA concerns a small group of human survivors traveling through the desert in search for others of their kind after a series of apocalypses. Press ready stills:
http://www.cbimage.com/Wandering_Era_still_1_300dpi.jpg
http://www.cbimage.com/Wandering_Era_still_2_300dpi.jpg

Suki Ewers & Clifford Novey's T ZERO is a metaphysical adventure in light and shadow inspired by the fog. Press ready stills http://picasaweb.google.com/CNovey/TZeroStills?feat=directlink
and video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=39RmL4IVNaQ

Jon Clark's SURGEON's REPTILE MESS simultaneously represents visually the repetitive synthesized rhythms of Minimal Techno music while still retaining human touch.

The Count of Manifesto & Hillary Kaye's ENCASED and MOURNING gerrymander the warfare state.
Jesse Drew's CULTURAL DEMOCRACY - Technocultural professor gets students to flip their wigs over Pixelvision. With rare Craig Baldwin appearance.

Donovan Seelinger's SOMETHING YOU HAVE TO KNOW - Whiz kid enlightens his audience.
Geoff Seelinger's THE CUTTING - A bloom is set up, controlled and taken on a journey that is pointless, scary, exciting and in moments beautiful. Press ready still- http://www.lalawest.org/thecutting/TheCuttingStill.png and http://www.vimeo.com/6579693

Seelinger's BREEZE OUT BACK - The effects of breeze on things observed from my back porch, seen in low resolution stuttering black and white pixels, produces an ominous dream-scape. The sounds of wind noise are constructed into music concrete. Press ready stills:http://lalawest.org/BreezeOutBack/BreezeOutBack1.png http://lalawest.org/BreezeOutBack/BreezeOutBack2.png
http://lalawest.org/BreezeOutBack/BreezeOutBack4.png http://lalawest.org/BreezeOutBack/BreezeOutBack6.png

Mariko Drew's WILD BEAST - Young gal and her kitten frolic about the light continuum.
Six-year-old Chester Burnett's DONUT MEMORIAL reanimates a dead pastry.
Bill Burnett's SONGS ARE is a statement of a true song believer.
David Healey presents his photos in DISCOVERING VENICE.
Joe Nucci's ME, THE P.A. & DAVID LEE is the third chapter in a captivating trilogy of hilarious limo driver recollections. His BENHAM'S DISK spins.
Stormin' Norman & Suzy Williams' BLACK EYE AT THE REDEYE energizes rag'n'roll with joyous passion.
Doug Ing's WORK asks if we work to live or live to work.
Will Erokan's KITING probes Sigurd Frey's experience with the Internet, credit card fraud, and 9/11.
Lisa Marr and Paolo Davanzo's THE CHASER surveys the sweet history of female actresses from Hollywood's silent era.
Karin Spritzler & George Russell's transportional dreamscape AS IF ONE BREATH breathes.
Gerry Fialka's EFFECTS PRECEDE CAUSES probes WC Fields as a wool in sheep Symbolism mousinging around with the Poe zone.
William Sabiston's CONVOLVULI feels like living x-rays, electrical storms, and flying saucer hallucinations. A trilogy of abstract music videos for his band Bulbs. www.aphidtrip.com

Mier N'Gewlieu's UCH! ACH! ECH! FEH! sounds off Yiddish wordage.
Denny Moynahan reinvents interactions with his filmic self, King Kukulele, in the near death experience SHARK HICKEY.
Jason Danti's DEX merges bop and the light fantastic.
Lala McClave's beat poetry evokes GODDESS VENICE.
Jerron Paxton's JUMP BOOGIE smoothes the blues.
Sunny War's POLICE STATE makes a political folk-punk statement.
Church of the Subgenius pioneer Janor Hypercleats' INTERVIEW WITH ROCK STAR MARILYN OSBOURNE returns with laugh-out-loud revitalizing of the street performer to stellar status.
Paul Bacca's DOESEND is another gem from Chicken Leather's Kill Radio vaults.
****************************
PXL THIS 19 ( an asterik denotes in tour, time permitting, and on compilation dvd )
1- SHARK HICKEY - Denny Moynahan, 6 minutes *
2- THE CUTTING - Geoff Seelinger, 6m
3- BREEZE OUT BACK - Geoff Seelinger, 3m *
4- SOMETHING YOU HAVE TO KNOW- Donovan Seelinger, 3 m
5- DONUT MEMORIAL- Chester Burnett, 3m *
6- SONGS ARE - Bill Burnett, 2m*
7- AS IF ONE BREATH - Karin Spritzler & George Russell, 6m *
8- ENCASED - The Count of Manifesto & Hillary Kaye, 2m*
9- COLOR PXL - James Wickstead, 4m *
10- BLACK EYE AT THE REDEYE - Stormin' Norman Zamcheck & Suzy Williams, 2m *
11- GODDESS VENICE- Lala McClave, 2m
12- DEX - Jason Danti, 6m
13- ME, THE P.A. & DAVID LEE -Joe Nucci, 9m *
14- BENHAM'S DISK- Joe Nucci, 1m
15- JUMP BOOGIE- Jerron Paxton, 3m *
16- POLICE STATE - Sunny War, 4m *
17- MOURNING - The Count of Manifesto & Hillary Kaye, 2m *
18- THE CHASER - Here & Now (Lisa Marr & Paolo Davanzo), 2m*
19- T ZERO - Suki Ewers & Clifford Novey, 4m*
20- KITING- Will Erokan, 8m*
21- INTERVIEW WITH ROCK STAR MARILYN OSBOURNE - Janor Hypercleats, 4m
22- SOUTHWEST MUSEUM 2009 RECAP - Michael Possert Jr, 3m *
23- CULTURAL DEMOCRACY - Jesse Drew, 6m *
24- WILD BEAST - Mariko Drew, 6m *
25- THE AESTHETICS OF FAILURE- Clint Enns, 3m *
26- WORK- Doug Ing, 3m *
27- I PUSH ON - LM Sabo, 2m *
28- SURGEON's REPTILE MESS - John Clark, 4m *
29- EFFECTS PRECEDE CAUSES - Gerry Fialka, 13m *
30- DISCOVERING VENICE - Dave Healey, 6m *
31- CONVOLVULI - William Sabiston, 8m *
32- THE WANDERING ERA - Chris Bentley, 12m *
33- UCH! ACH! ECH! FEH! - Mier N'Gewlieu, 6m
34- DOESEND - Paul Bacca, 4m
****************************
PXL THIS 18 http://www.laughtears.com/PXL-THIS-18.html is available for screenings/workshops. "PXL THIS 18 is the best festival yet." - Paolo Davanzo, Director of Echo Park FIlm Center http://www.echoparkfilmcenter.org rent past PXL THIS festivals and also rents PXL 2000 cameras. EPFC screens PXL THIS 19 in May 20, 2010. See PXL THIS 18shorts: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xF0VKPH0ypg& & http://www.vimeo.com/3795336 & http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pYGEvm7FV4 & Stills: http://fooie.com/birdlyStills.zip

PXL THIS Director Gerry Fialka is available for Pixelvision & Media Ecology workshops. http://www.laughtears.com/workshops.html
"Fialka's workshops are in depth communication of something extremely elusive - the history of the unimaginable - and his lively interpretation renders it useful." - William Farley, Award-winning filmmaker

"Fialka's animated Media Ecology Workshop acted like a Karate chop on the minds of my film/television students. It's rare for high school students to be exposed to these basic media fundamentals with the historical tracks that lead into present day truths. What a reality check for teens. The kids enjoyed the high-energy presentation and got a mental reorientation of how media plays on their day-to-day lives." -Romeo Carey, Media Director, Beverly Hills High School

PXL THIS 20 is accepting entries. Deadline is Oct 22, 2010. Here's a preview of Paul Yates' entry http://www.vimeo.com/4319553

michaelkoshkin@gmail.com is making a documentary about Pixelvision.

PXL 2000 Color Camcorder - A Brief History by James Wickstead (of JWDA) jwda@wicksteaddesign.com,
In 1995, some years after the demise of the original PXL 2000 Camcorder, JWDA was approached by Hasbro Great Britain to see if a new camera could be developed, this time incorporating higher resolution and full color. The British division of Hasbro was a small and very well structured group with a keen insight into the toy and consumer product markets.

Technically, putting all the “information” required from 3 color channels and voice onto an off-the-shelf audio tape was a considerable challenge. We were to use the original PXL Camera concept but the technical difficulty and needs for custom made, precision parts and electronics was daunting. All of this would end with a product as easy to use and very comparable to a child’s tape recorder and also be inexpensive.
Hasbro USA became aware of the program and immediately took the project from the British subsidiary. This turned out to be a major problem, since the parent company had established a poor reputation with a key vendor. Further, the parent company had no technical ability and was strictly acting as management and contract control.

The project was initially composed of intense R&D to design and prototype the camera to make certain that theory and results matched. Thereafter, we would need to provide the detail design associated with production.
The program evolved slower than expected. There were considerable negotiations required with the key vendor to provide assurances that difficulties experienced with Hasbro, previously, would not be repeated. Once placated, they began to better support the program. Within 8 months, a development system had been created and the rudimentary video was operational, storing and playing color video back from audio tape. At this point, it was obvious that the system would work and we could see physical results, although needing technical refinement.

Hasbro canceled the program after approximately 10 months. They were known for a short project attention span and this was no exception. It was quite a difference from the focus and dedication of our original partner, Fisher Price.

JWDA developed the camera further, using our own resources, but it was becoming obvious that imaging technology was evolving quickly and that solid state and not tape memory was the future. It was just a matter of time before that technology came down in cost to match the PXL concept. Other companies wanted to pick up where Hasbro left off, but it was decided that the time for PXL had past. The project officially ended in mid 1997.

In hindsight, the PXL camera was revolutionary in it’s time. The technology allowed manufacture of a very low cost easy to use camera. However, the real appeal wasn’t just the cost, but the performance, which only a child and creative adult could truly appreciate. Low resolution, black and white images and strange artifacts when used, were hallmarks of the camera and provided most astonishing results in the hands of the artist. the color PXL was a technical tour de force, but it was also an afterthought.

From this person’s perspective, meeting and interacting with the artists was as much a highpoint as seeing the original product born into the marketplace. HOME

PXL THIS 20 (2010)

2010-10-26T06:17:00.001-07:00

PXL THIS 20, the 20th annual toy camera film festival featuring Pixelvision films made with the Fisher-Price PXL-2000 camcorder, premieres December 13. PXL THIS, the second oldest film festival in Los Angeles, celebrates visionary moving image artists from 4-years-olds to professionals.

for immediate release
contact: Gerry Fialka 310-306-7330
pfsuzy@aol.com Visit: http://pxl2000.blogspot.com/ and http://sites.google.com/site/pxlthis/ and http://www.laughtears.com/ and http://www.youtube.com/user/pxlthis

PXL THIS 20, the 20th annual toy camera film festival

screens Monday, Dec 13, 2010, two different shows 7 & 9pm at the Unurban Coffeehouse, 3301 Pico Blvd, Santa Monica, CA, 90404, 310-315-0056, free admission. More info: 310-306-7330 http://www.laughtears.com/

6pm preshow features a sneak preview of Wickstead's Wonder - an interview with James Wickstead, the inventor of the Fisher Price PXL 2000 camcorder. Wickstead jwda@wicksteaddesign.com is available for interviews. Scroll down to read a recent article on him.

PXL THIS celebrates its 20th year of creativity by everyone from kids to professionals. One of the most unique film festivals ever, PXL THIS has been attended by Oliver Stone, Daryl Hannah, Kim Fowley among many more. Pixelvision has even made it onto the big screen via Richard Linklater (Slacker), Michael Almereyda (Nadja, produced by David Lynch) and Craig Baldwin (Sonic Outlaws). The irresistible irony of the PXL 2000 is that the camera's ease-of-use and affordability, which entirely democratizes movie-making, has inspired the creation of some of the most visionary, avant and luminous film of our time. "If movies offer an escape from everyday life, Pixelvision is the Houdini of the film world." - SF Weekly

PXL THIS, featuring films made with the Fisher-Price PXL 2000 toy camcorder, is one of the longest running film festivals in the entertainment capital of the world. Celebrating "cinema povera" moving image art, it evokes Marcel Duchamp's axiom "Poor tools require better skills." Pixelators from across the globe hoick up inventive approaches to the unassuming throw-away of consumer culture. These low-tech hi-jinx films come through loud and clear by reframing a new cinema language. Past PXL THIS participants have included Lee Ranaldo (Sonic Youth), Chris Metzler (Fishbone & Salton Sea documentaries), James & Sadie Benning, Joe Gibbons, Cecilia Dougherty, Peggy Ahwesh, Jesse Drew, Margie Strosser and Michael Almereyda.

"Gerry Fialka’s annual PXL THIS is a reliably surprising and seductive round-up of recent work achieved with the PXL 2000 camera. This humble outdated “toy” continues to bring out the visionary child in filmmakers and viewers alike, and no one has kept the PXL flame burning longer or brighter than Gerry." - Michael Almereyda, director

"Gerry Fialka's PXL THIS festival snaps, crackles and pops off the screen with the funky, user-friendly energy of real first-person cinema. Goofy, gorgeous, and altogether groovy, his provocative program of pieces produced with the Fisher-Price PXL 2000 toy video camera is not only downright entertaining, but more, its blipping and buzzing black 'n' white picture-bits coalesce into a veritable inspiration to all those who cherish the playful, spontaneous gestures and low-cost of electronic folk art." - Craig Baldwin, director & curator.

Hollywood Reporter called Pixelvision a "precursor of today's DV filmmaking."

"When the aliens are here and deciding whether to vaporize all mankind for our inhumanity, cruelty and greed, showing the aliens PXL THIS will save the world. PXL THIS shows our best nature as humanist creators and subversives against those who deserve it. Save the world. Support PXL THIS." - George Manupelli, founder of the Ann Arbor Film Festival, filmmaker, poet, collagist and political/environmental activist

Cinesource PXL article by Gerry Fialka - http://cinesourcemagazine.com/index.php?/site/comments/pxl_triple_fake/

PXL THIS Director Fialka - hires 300 dpi still with PXL Cam - http://www.laughtears.com/images/Gerry-360dpi.jpg

and Bio - http://www.laughtears.com/bio.html

PXL THIS 20 highlights include:

Always a favorite at PXL THIS, L M Sabo's OIL KILLS takes you on a journey of America's love affair with Big Oil and the devastating consequences. Press ready stills: http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/Oil-Kills-1.jpg & http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/Oil-Kills-2.jpg & http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/Oil-Kills-3.jpg &

http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/Oil-Kills-4.jpg & http://members.cox.net/l.m.sabo/Oil-Kills-5.jpg

Nicole & Michael Possert's ARROYO SECO RIVER SONG, starring George Willis, is a moving tribute to the most important tributary to the Los Angels River. This historical corridor has been home to Native Americans, missionaries, rancheros, explorers, artists and dreamers who have sculpted this valley into LA's seminal region. The founding of the City of Los Angels is at the confluence of these two rivers. Press images: http://www.flickr.com/photos/2007pxl/sets/72157625268199688/

Philip Marion's SPOON & PACKET conjures a miniature parable for a larger world. Press ready stills: www.eveningalbum.com/SpoonAndPacketPXLstills.jpg

PXL THIS superstar Eli Elliott's ROXY RUBICON EPISODE 5 alternatively energizes Menippean satire and time warps all systems from collapsing, just in time to save the future. His SUZY & BRAD'S PINCHBACK bellows Bessie Smith blues big time.

With jubilant innocence four-year old Anwyn Lees remakes THE WIZARD OF OZ on the front porch with Mom & Dad.

Jesse Drew's DOLBY - Technocultural professor's industrial shots of factory job recalls Russian Constructivism.

Seminal cinema experimenter Bryan Konefsky's FERTILE GROUND CORPORATE SLUG suggests the nitty gritty influences of media visionary, Gene Youngblood (author of the ground-breaking book Expanded Cinema) as described by investigative journalist Greg Palast. http://vimeo.com/17020232

Award winning filmmaker Terri Sarris contributes three: DEAD MAN'S CLOTHES (Sarris & Frank Pahl - Oh, the stories second-hand things might tell...) and SPARKLE (Fourth of July, 2010) and GLITCH. http://vimeo.com/user3842874 Every decade sees one PXL that really captures the inherent uniqueness of Pixelvision. For example, James Benning's TABLETOP in the very first PXL THIS, and Lisa's Marr's RUGRAT in 2004. Sarris astutely utilizes PXL's innate characteristics in GLITCH.

Moving image artist extraordinaire David Sherman's PROJECTION/EJECTION shutters the ephemeral light in blinding the baseness of bodies in motion.

Squeezebox tickler Nick Newlin's TWICE AS NICE feels the love. Newlin interprets Thelonius on the accordion in MONK.

Michael Vile's THE MADGICIAN astounds with a floating cigarette.

PXL Pioneer tENTATIVELY a cONVENIENCE's PHILOSOPHER'S UNION MEMBER'S MOUTHPIECE yelps with fresh ideas from modern thinkers: Alan Rabbit Suit, Richard Tryzno Ellsberry and John Berndt.

Six-year-old Chester Burnett's CALIFORNIA STUDIO playfully quakes the Hollywood template.

Paul Yates' DRAWBRIDGE demonstrates how surreal PXL in-camera effects can be. http://www.vimeo.com/4319553

Robin Carter's intriguing PYTHAGORAS AS POET explores the birth of science, mathematics, and philosophy. When the Phoenician's brought their writing system to the Greeks, it started a revolution of mind. In the midst of this, Pythagoras emerged in 500BC as the first philosopher. Myth and magic were as much apart of his world as number and theory. Since time immemorial the archivist of cultural knowledge was the poet, and Pythagoras followed this tradition and divined the properties numbers and space from the gods. The alphabet changed the world forever, as it changed the minds of the ancient Greeks. As the alphabet anchored in culture after culture, the mind of humankind has been shaped in kind, but as digital technology usurped the power of reading, what does that mean for us?

TROG ALLEY is another installment of Will Erokan's epic pxloitation compendium, Las Trampas, Joe recalls a highly transformative visionary experience, involving black magic, brotherhood symbolism & crystal meth.

Venice Boardwalk performer Joe Nucci's SEE NOTE is the fourth episode in the captivating trilogy of hilarious limo driver recollections.

PSALM 4 "3" + ME by Giuseppe Nuccini evokes the Venetian Rock Opera.

Mary Jane Shoultz's SPILTERACY probes the death of the visual, linear straight-jackets of books as a plus. Schoultz, education professor, founder of the "open" school movement and a close advisor to Marshall McLuhan, Norman Mailer & Ivan Illich, updates our consciousness with the electric environment as the major learning tool. "Our young people are not illiterate, they are post-literate. Today's students want immediate roles, not far-off goals." - McLuhan. The "S" is SPILTERACY should be a dollar sign $. "The trouble with a cheap specialized education is that you never stop paying for it." - McLuhan

Stormin' Norman & Suzy Williams' VENICE LULLABY swings rag'n'roll with joyous passion.

Jason Danti's TRANE merges bop with music as ideas.

Robert Dobbs' SEX, DEATH & PIXELVISION reignites the Menippean marshalling of McLuhan's science and the certainty of obscure artifacts.

In WASTING TIME LOOKIN' IN THE MIRROR, Pixelator Dahvi Bolog realizes his life.

Mariko Drew's IT'S A LEMONHEAD - Grade school gals profess quizzical inquiries about life.

Rex Butters & Geoff Seelinger's 7 DUDLEY conjures a montage of Sponto Gallery home movies filmed in words.

Maureen Cotter's COWBOY PUSSY recounts her experiences as a chaplain in a mental hospital.

Gerry Fialka's PARALLEL WORLDER doubles the single unified theory as Martha Graham and WC Fields dig duality dancing in mysterious metaphors of Beffheartian time & Vorticist space.

PXL innovator Doug Ing provides two engaging shorts: DEATH (Ruminations on death by the Loor Children and 65 year old Phil Kaplan) and BEST LAVA VIEW RIGHT HERE (Ing, his father and friends explore the aftermath of a recent volcano eruption on the island of Hawaii from the balcony of a house amidst the lava field).

Pixelvision avatars Lisa Marr and Paolo Davanzo's MY TERRIFIC PAST is a walk down memory lane PXL-style.

Arthur Coleman's FOG ON GLASS breathes gray azure over the mirror. His MARIGOLD SERENADE mutes ambient birdsongs.

Suki Ewers & Clifford Novey's ROUNDS comprehensively surveys illusive visual domains.

Elric Kane's SLOW DRAW appropriates bad action films evoking something more intimate than mere on-screen carnage via Pixelvision.

It's a family affair with visionary PXL-Dad Geoff Seelinger contributing 5 titles:

WASHED UP - Fragments of text and images that have washed up from the sea, tell a story.

MOMENTS & MESS UPS - Bits and bobs of momentary delights, significant moments and abstractions that are unexpected results of the PXL2000 camera.

KICK'N AROUND - Following the feet of those kicking a ball around on the beach renders a high contrast motion graphic extravaganza.

LIGHT QUEST - Patterns of reflected light upon wet surfaces of the beach and the breath of shoreline waves.

CHASE - The PXL2000 abstractly renders a fast moving chase game at the beach

Geoff's children: 7 year-old Donovan's SHRINGLY: SCI-ENCE delves into the reaches of his imagination about the mysteries of extreme science. Donovan uses toys, balls, reflections and abstract images to illuminate possibilities and ideas of his fancy.

4 year-old Gwyneth's AND THEY PLAYED & THEY PLAYED & THEY PLAYED shares a stream of consciousness, that includes stories from the heart, songs about poop, ugly words and other joyous indiscretions.

PXL Pioneer Paul Bacca's TETRAHEDRALLY trips the light fantastic in grass roots guerrilla radio waves fashion,

Former Second City Music Director and comedian Jonathan Menchin's HEY YOU IN THE FUTURE alerts wanna-bes not yet born.

Called the female Robert Johnson, Sunny War's SHEEP grazes musicality supreme.

Denny Moynahan's KING KUKULELE KOGNITION joins Denny's live self and PXL-self as they ruminate on his 46th birthdays' inner thoughts.

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PXL THIS 20 Unurban 12-13-10

7pm:

THE WIZARD OF OZ - Anwyn Lees, 8 minutes

SHRINGLY: SCI-ENCE - Donovan Seelinger, 5m

AND THEY PLAYED & THEY PLAYED & THEY PLAYED - Gwyneth Seelinger, 6m

WASHED UP - Geoff Seelinger, 3m

MOMENTS & MESS UPS - Geoff Seelinger, 2m

KICK'N AROUND - Geoff Seelinger, 3m

LIGHT QUEST - Geoff Seelinger, 3m

CHASE - Geoff Seelinger, 2m

SPOON & PACKET - Philip Marion, 11m

CALIFORNIA STUDIO - Chester Burnett, 3m

PROJECTION/EJECTION - David Sherman - 3m

SUZY & BRAD'S PINCHBACK - Eli Elliott, 4m

IT'S A LEMONHEAD - Mariko Drew, 3m

TWICE AS NICE - Nick Newlin, 4m

PYTHAGORAS AS POET - Robin Carter, 5m

DEAD MAN'S CLOTHES - Terri Sarris & Frank Pahl, 3m

SPARKLE - Terri Sarris, 3m

GLITCH - Terri Sarris, 3m

FOG ON GLASS - Arthur Coleman, 2m

SEE NOTE - Joe Nucci, 6m

PSALM 4 "3" + ME - Giuseppe Nuccini, 1m

BEST LAVA VIEW RIGHT HERE - Doug Ing, 4m

OIL KILLS - L. M. Sabo, 2m

SPILTERACY - Mary Jane Shoultz, 4m

7 DUDLEY - Rex Butters & Geoff Seelinger, 4m

9pm:

KING KUKULELE KOGNITION - Denny Moynahan, 4m

ARROYO SECO RIVER SONG - Nicole & Michael Possert, 4m

DRAWBRIDGE - Paul Yates, 3m

ROUNDS - Suki Ewers & Clifford Novey, 5m

SLOW DRAW Elric Kane, 7m

ROXY RUBICON EPISODE 5 - Eli Elliott, 6m

PARALLEL WORLDER - Gerry Fialka, 10m

HEY YOU IN THE FUTURE - Jonathan Menchin, 4m

MY TERRIFIC PAST - Lisa Marr & Paolo Davanzo, 4m

TROG ALLEY - Will Erokan, 6m

FERTILE GROUND CORPORATE SLUG - Bryan Konefsky, 4m

COWBOY PUSSY - Maureen Cotter, 4m

VENICE LULLABY - Stormin' Norman Zamcheck & Suzy Williams, 3m

WASTING TIME LOOKIN' IN THE MIRROR - Dahvi Bolog, 3m

TRANE - Jason Danti, 4m

SEX, DEATH & PIXELVISION - Robert Dobbs, 4m

DOLBY - Jesse Drew, 3m

THE MADGICIAN - Michael Vile, 3m

MARIGOLD SERENADE - Arthur Coleman, 3m

PHILOSOPHER'S UNION MEMBER'S MOUTHPIECE: Alan Rabbit Suit - tENTATIVELY a cONVENIENCE, 6m

PHILOSOPHER'S UNION MEMBER'S MOUTHPIECE:Richard Tryzno Ellsberry-tENTATIVELY a cONVENIENCE,6m

PHILOSOPHER'S UNION MEMBER'S MOUTHPIECE: John Berndt - tENTATIVELY a cONVENIENCE, 6m

SHEEP - Sunny War, 4m

MONK - Nick Newlin, 4m

DEATH - Doug Ing, 5m

TETRAHEDRALLY - Paul Bacca, 5m

(the scheduling order of films in this program subject to change)

***************************************************

Program Notes for San Francisco Cinematheque's AN INVENTION WITHOUT A FUTURE -
PIXELVISION: ELECTRONIC FOLK ART. (comprehensive history of PXL THIS and Pixelvision)

http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:VT1Pm-oc9goJ:www.sfcinematheque.org/ee/images/uploads/PN2_10PXL.PDF+%22san+francisco+cinematheque%22+pxl&hl=en&gl=us&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEESii8N3c8YRRSdwGAdMDLt-VKxQRzG6MQ09Mj0i2zVNcte74oKqNp8XdA54dGE5LuWvVYUo96Z5hbhzIb_qYhhkkroluQYFeIiCSzSl6-Wp4wcbyC7fDzlR3Wr60Hi_x_HME_Zit&sig=AHIEtbTh3oEPNjWhZHgpiIsAm0RS4PQrMQ

Andrea Nina McCarthy's 2005 MIT thesis "Toying With Obsolescence: Pixelvision Filmmakers & The Fisher Price PXL 2000 Camera" is essential reading.

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:pwHJLt5QPRkJ:cms.mit.edu/research/theses/AndreaMcCarty2005.pdf+pxl+2000+mit&cd=2&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us

Pixelvision enables filmmakers to tap into that child-like innocence all artists seek in the creative process. What could be easier than starting with a kids toy. John Lane's 2001 book Timeless Simplicity articulates wabi-sabi, "the perfect antidote to the pervasively slick style of homogenized efficency." Pixelvisionaries evoke the spirit of Wabi-sabi: "This elusive philosphy is about sufficiency and restraint. It is about simplicity, the minor and hidden, the modest and humble, the imperfect and the evanescent. It is about treading lightly on the planet. An added dimension is its implicit message urging us to forget the seductions of success - wealth, status, power and luxury."

"As for the PXL 2000 camera, because it’s a child’s toy there’s a certain naiveté which is inherent in the productions. Yet due to its technology, the PXL 2000 camera produces these edgy, gritty, “rough as a night in jail” images. I find the juxtaposition of these two attributes very interesting and useful in many of the politically oriented pieces I’ve produced. From a technical perspective, I would say my primary contribution to the field is that I created a filmmaking style using the PXL 2000 which I call Machinima Vérité. Machinima Vérité combines Machinima (creating movies from 3D PC game engines) with Cinéma Vérité techniques to create a sense of realism. So basically I produce and render the movie from a game engine on a PC, display the video on a high resolution LCD, and recapture the video on the LCD using a PXL 2000 camera. My videos “CATACLYSM” and “bursting in air” are a couple of examples of this technique. I really appreciate all of the effort Gerry Fialka puts in with the PXL THIS festival. If it weren’t for Gerry, interest in the PXL 2000 would have died out many years ago." - L. M. Sabo

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PXL THIS 21 - Entry deadline Oct 22, 2011 - simply send a dvd to Gerry Fialka 2427 1/2 Glyndon Ave, Venice, CA 90291, 310-306-7330, pfsuzy@aol.com NO entry fee.

PXL THIS Director Gerry Fialka is available for Pixelvision & Media Ecology workshops. http://www.laughtears.com/workshops.html "Fialka's workshops are in depth communication of something extremely elusive - the history of the unimaginable - and his lively interpretation renders it useful." - William Farley, Award-winning filmmaker

michaelkoshkin@gmail.com is making a documentary about Pixelvision.

Best Of PXL THIS (13-19) screened at Dallas Video Festival Sept 25, 2010 at 6pm http://www.videofest.org/

PXL THIS 19 screened http://www.laughtears.com/PXL-THIS-19.htmlthe Sat, Oct 23 at 8:30pm at Other Cinema, 992 Valencia St (& 21st), San Fran CA 94110, 415-648-0654, admission $6 http://www.othercinema.com/

Gerry Fialka & Jon Rappoport on Progressive Radio Network 11-15-10 http://garynull.squarespace.com/the-jon-rappoport-show/

______________________________________

PXL 2000 Inventor- James Wickstead (of JWDA) jwda@wicksteaddesign.com,

Article on Wickstead-

http://www.dailyrecord.com/article/20101102/BUSINESS05/101101065/1003/BUSINESS/Cedar-Knolls-N.J.-inventor-applying-experience-to-new-technology

Cedar Knolls N.J. inventor applying experience to new technology by Sally Silverman 11-2-10 The Daily Record HANOVER — James Wickstead is founder of James Wickstead Design Associates in Cedar Knolls, a company that specializes in product development for the medical, telecom, commercial and consumer markets. Founded in 1968, JWDA has generated more than 40 patents and product licenses on behalf of clients including AT&T, C.R. Bard, Becton Dickenson, Fisher Price, Parker Brothers, Siemans and many more. Most sought after products: "Anything new in technology like applications for software, global positioning systems and wireless applied to all products," Wickstead said. His best inventions: The Black & Decker vegetable steamer; a patient-controlled analgesia device; a device to measure the chemistry of animals by analyzing their blood called the Vettest; and the PXL-2000 camcorder for Fisher-Price. Worst invention: A device that uses high-energy plasma to cure arthritis. "We are asked to implement somebody else's idea. Whether it sells, is something else," Wickstead said. Inventor's traits: "Everybody is an inventor, but you need a massive amount of curiosity and look at things as to how they can be made better," Wickstead said. Beginnings: Wickstead was born in Pompton Plains in 1941 and grew up there. After high school, he attended Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, where he received a degree in industrial design. "While in high school, I didn't know this type of work existed," Wickstead said. "I was interested in building cars, but an uncle of mine who was a landscape architect suggested industrial design. Before that, I was considering mechanical engineering," he said. Career path: After working for several small companies in New York and Philadelphia, Wickstead was drafted to serve in the U.S. military in Vietnam. He was stationed at the Aberdeen (Md.) Proving Ground as a scientist for two years, where he worked on armor and battle tanks. "It was the think tank for the Army — they would give us a problem and want a solution in 30 days," he said. Following military service, Wickstead founded his company, fist in Maryland then in Glen Rock. "There were lots of design firms, but they couldn't make products or get them into the marketplace," Wickstead said. Back to Jersey: "I camped all over the United States to determine the best place to locate my company and came here in 1979," he said. At home: Wickstead lives in Mendham with his wife, Jean. He enjoys fly fishing, hiking and, as a car enthusiast, he still does all the mechanical work on his two "old" Ferraris.