Rick Prelinger: Lost Landscapes of San Francisco 4, Fri. Dec 4

Rick Prelinger: Lost Landscapes of San Francisco 4 – The Long Now.

Rick Prelinger, a guerrilla archivist who collects the uncollected and makes it accessible, presents the fourth of his annual Lost Landscapes of San Francisco screenings. You’ll see an eclectic montage of rediscovered and rarely-seen film clips showing life, landscapes, labor and leisure in a vanished San Francisco as captured by amateurs, newsreel cameramen and industrial filmmakers.

How we remember and record the past reveals much about how we address the future. Prelinger will preface the screening with a brief talk on how historical memory is shifting away from mass culture towards individual expression, and what consequences will arise from the emerging massive matrix of personal records.

Join us for a reception with no-host bar following the Seminar in the main Lobby of the Herbst Theater.

Doors open 7 pm, Talk begins 7:30pm lasting ~1.5 hours

Herbst Theatre on Van Ness Ave. San Francisco, California

 

Saving The Bay | KQED Documentary Series Begins Thur Oct. 8

Saving The Bay | KQED Public Media for Northern CA.

Narrated by Robert Redford, this lively and timely series is about one of America’s greatest natural resources – San Francisco Bay. Shot in high definition, it consists of four episodes focusing on the geological, cultural, and developmental history of San Francisco Bay and the larger northern California watershed, from the Sierra Nevada mountains to the Farallon Islands in the Pacific Ocean.
From the Gold Rush to the Golden Gate Bridge, and through World’s Fairs and World Wars, San Francisco Bay has been central to the identity of one of the world’s leading economic, academic, recreational, and cultural regions. This series explores its evolution, how we almost lost and then saved the Bay, and how we are planning for the future, including wetland restoration, increased public access, and balancing the often competing needs of a fragile ecosystem that is the centerpiece of a major urban area.

Upcoming Broadcasts:

Marvel of Nature (Prehistory – 1848) (#101) Duration: 56:31 CC Stereo TVG

In the first episode, photo-realistic animation illustrates the formation of the Bay following the last Ice Age. It introduces the first inhabitants along the Bay’s shores, including Native Peoples along with flora and fauna, and continues through European exploration and settlement, including Spanish, Russian and ultimately, American influences that dramatically altered the region.

Harbor of Harbors (1849 – 1906) (#102) Duration: 56:42 CC Stereo TVG

This episode follows San Francisco’s “rapid monstrous maturity” into a major metropolis following the California Gold Rush. Establishing the infrastructure to support the instant city meant radical change for San Francisco Bay. By the century’s end, San Francisco Bay was the center of a broad economic empire on the Pacific.

Miracle Workers (1906 – 1959) (#103) Duration: 56:58 CC Stereo TVG

This episode begins with The Great Earthquake and Fire of 1906, which accelerated the dispersion of people and industry to the East Bay region. Advances in engineering gave rise to the first of California’s massive water re-distribution projects, paralleling the era of great bridge building. World War II saw the Bay transformed into the greatest shipbuilding center the world had ever known.

Bay in the Balance (#104) Duration: 56:46 CC Stereo TVG

In the final episode, the very survival of the Bay is threatened by the postwar boom. Viewers are introduced to the leaders of the Save the Bay campaign of the 1960s and the birth of the national mass environmental movement. As the Bay Area looks to the future, the issue becomes how best to balance the competing demands of a major urban center set amidst an environmentally significant landscape.

 

LaborFest Schedule Now Online: EVENTS July 2-July 31

LaborFest 2009
July 2 – July 31

LaborFest 2009 Schedule is up

This year is the 75th anniversary of the San Francisco General Strike and the West Coast maritime workers strike. The ‘34 strike and maritime strike was an important point in  strengthening organized labor and bringing hundreds of thousands of workers into our unions.  In commemoration of this significant historical anniversary for San Francisco and Northern California labor, LaborFest will be having many special events including an art exhibition, presentations, a labor jeopardy contest as well as a labor film festival that will include videos of the San Francisco general strike.

There are also plans for a commemoration march and concert in San Francisco and educational conference.

LaborFest this year will also be honoring the workers who made the strike, the role of the San Francisco Labor Council and the workers who have built the Bay Area including building the San Francisco Bay Bridge, Golden Gate Bridge and the newly constructed Al Zampa Bridge which is the first major bridge named after an iron worker. Labor faces great challenges today as it did 75 years ago and the need to learn about our history, and how we won victories in the past is vital for today.

 

“Visual Acoustics: The Modernism of Julius Shulman”; Special Screening at LACMA June 7, 2 pm

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art will present a special screening June 7, 2009 at 2 p.m. of a new documentary, narrated by Dustin Hoffman, that explores the monumental career of Julius Shulman, the 98-year-old Los Angeles-based architectural photographer. From the announcement:

Julius Shulman combines the organic with the synthetic, melding nature with revolutionary urban design in images that helped shape the careers of some of the key architects of the twentieth century, including Richard Neutra, Rudolph Schindler, Pierre Koenig, and John Lautner.

The documentary was directed by Eric Bricker and written by Mr. Bricker, Phil Ethington and Jessica Hundley.

Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 5905 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90036

 

Rick Prelinger is the Coolest Archivist in the World: Lost Landscapes of San Francisco May 16 the Exploratorium

After years of close interaction with the many  wonderful, quirky, and dedicated archivists in this great country of ours, I am unilaterally nominating Rick Prelinger as the coolest archivist on the planet. He will showcase his wares again on May 16 from 2 to 4 pm at the Exploratorium in San Francisco. The event is called Lost Landscapes of San Francisco and is not to be missed.

Prelinger invites people to respond out loud to an array of short clips he digs up from God knows where. Historians, residents, and hipsters alike delight in this material and Prelinger’s witty, upbeat narration of the clips.

What other archivist introduces his materials with references to Borges and citing the enclosure on the archival commons?

See the event page here.

Preview the last version of Lost Landscapes, a perennial event, here.
SF Chron article on a past version is here.

 

News from the California Living New Deal Project

The California Living New Deal Project has posted a second edition of the California New Deal Project News, on the project’s website.  The news includes notice of a New Deal Film Festival at the Pacific Film Archive, April 1-19, 2009.  

 

Screening: “Trading Dirt with Simon Rodia & Allan Kaprow” Feb. 25 in Santa Monica

The 18th Street Arts Center in Santa Monica will present a screening Feb. 25 of “Trading Dirt with Simon Rodia & Allan Kaprow” (40 mins.), a film by Rosie Lee Hooks and Paul. S. Rogers, followed by a conversation with Rosie Lee Hooks, art historian Marlena Donahue, writer Jori Finkel and Suzanne Lacy.

From the 18th Street Arts Center website:

“Trading Dirt with Simon Rodia & Allan Kaprow” was created for the Allan Kaprow “Art As Life Exhibition” at MOCA Geffen Contemporary in Spring 2008. The film intercuts vintage footage from the film ‘Watts Towers” by William Hale with contemporary images of the Watts Community. The production also refers to the historic “Happenings” work of Allan Kaprow, bringing together two Southern California historic moments in art while exploring the generosity of artists, giving back, and the real meaning of community.

Location: The 18th Street Arts Center, 1657 18th Street, Santa Monica, 90404

Weds., Feb 25, 7pm

Click here for more info

 

Hearst: The Man Behind the Myth; Talk at LACMA, Jan. 18

Cari Beauchamp, award-winning author and filmmaker, presents a lecture on the life of William Randolph Hearst.  Among Ms. Beauchamp’s books is Without Lying Down: Frances Marion and the Powerful Women of Early Hollywood, which features the career of Hearst paramour Marion Davies and her favorite screenwriter, Frances Marion.  Ms. Beauchamp’s latest book, Joseph P. Kennedy Presents: His Hollywood Years, will be published in February. Book signing will follow the lecture.

Sunday, January 18, 2:00 pm, Bing Theater

Free, no reservations.

In association with the exhibition, “Hearst the Collector,” continuing until Feb. 1, 2009

Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 5905 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90036

 

CALL FOR PAPERS/FILM/EXHIBIT: Kerouac’s On the Road and the Beats: Film on K in Big Sur and Scroll Exhibit, University of Birmingham, UK (Deadline, Oct. 11; Conference: Thur. Dec. 11-Dec. 12)

Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be a website for this conference. The most complete listing is at H-California at the link here, above, or below.–ed.

The famous 1951 ’scroll’ version of Jack Kerouac’s On the Road is on display at the Barber Institute, University of Birmingham during December 2008 and January 2009 — contact r.j.ellis@bham.ac.uk for further details.

Cfp: Jack Kerouac, Kerouac’s On the Road and the Beats

A two day conference at the University of Birmingham UK

Thursday 11 December 2008 and Friday 12 December 2008

Marking the fiftieth anniversary of On the Road’s publication in the UK, in 1958 (following its 1957 publication in the US). The University of Birmingham has arranged for the 1951 original typescript manuscript of On the Road – the world-famous scroll of 1951 – to come to the Barber Institute at the University during December 2008 and January 2009. A series of events is planned to celebrate this, including a Film Event (during the evening of 11 December) timed to coincide with this two-day conference, which will likely include the UK premiere showing of One Fast Move and I’m Gone: Kerouac’s Big Sur, produced by Jim Sampas.

The conference will take as its focus the ‘Beats’ and their relations to On the Road and its themes –travel, jazz, sexuality and gender, rebellion, disaffiliation and alienation, class and ethnicity. Plenary speakers will include Tim Hunt (author of Kerouac’s Crooked Road), speaking on how being able to study the scroll ms. adjusts our perspective upon On the Road, and Matt Theado.

Please do come along to this exciting event and – if you wish – deliver a paper. CFP: If you want to deliver a paper please submit a title for your paper and an abstract of between 100 and 250 words for consideration to: r.j.ellis@bham.ac.uk by 31 October 2008

 

FILM/Mini-CONFERENCE: 50th Anniversary of Hitchcock’s Vertigo, Stanford U. (Thur. Oct. 16 Film; Fri., Oct. 17, Talks)

Celebration of the 50th Anniversary of Hitchcock’s Vertigo

Stanford Humanities Center

Thursday, October 16, 2008, 7:00 p.m.
Film screening of the movie Vertigo
Aquarius Theatre in Palo Alto
430 Emerson St
Palo Alto, CA 94301

Friday, October 17, 2008, 11:00 a.m.
“The Perfection of Form”
Richard Allen, Professor and Chair of Cinema Studies at New York University.

Professor Richard Allen is editor of The Hitchcock Annual and a collection of essays from the journal, The Hitchcock Annual Anthology, will be published this Fall by Wallflower Press. He is author, most recently, of Hitchcock’s Romantic Irony (Columbia University Press, 2007).

12:30 pm Lunch Break

Presentations by aficionados 1:30-3:30 pm

Speakers:
Jean-Pierre Dupuy, Stanford
Roland Greene, Stanford
Marilyn Fabe, UC Berkeley
Moderator: Pavle Levi, Stanford

4:00 pm
Roundtable discussion with all participants including Pierre-Francois Mourier, French Consul General, and Jean-Marie Apostolidès, Stanford
Location
Stanford Humanities Center
424 Santa Teresa Street, Stanford, CA

 

NEWS: CSA Announces Partnership With Art California, A Major Internet Resource

The CSA has partnered with Art California, a major internet resource for the arts across the state. Judy Malloy, a journalist on and advocate for the arts, has managed the Art California site since 2004, compiling thousands of links related to film, painting, music, museums, archives, writers in the web directory portion of the site. She has also maintained a significant calendar on events across the state.

Art California is an achievement that will benefit CSA members and constituents. Ms. Malloy will collaborate with Aaron Wilcher, the CSA blog editor, to keep the CSA informed on news, events, and resources on California arts through our calendar and news page. This, in turn, will inform our partnership with the H-California discussion network.

We encourage you to visit her site and use it in your research, education, and writing projects.

 

NEWS: CSA Announces Partnership With the H-California Discussion Network

The CSA and H-California (Humanities Discussion Network, California) are proud to announce a new partnership to advance their missions to serve the communities of scholars, activists, and professionals who rely on scholarship in the humanities for their work. We are joining forces to strengthen the service we provide our communities.

In the last year, the CSA has undertaken a more robust approach to its use of the internet to serve its members by adopting a new website and a blog. These projects will be enhanced by collaborating with the editors at H-California who run a listserv (an email list), and an online forum with resources, through the international Humanities Network, h-net.org.

H-California functions as a way for scholars, activists, and nonprofit professionals to communicate about scholarly projects about California. Many of the postings are book reviews, calls for papers, event announcements, queries for projects, new resources, and so forth.

The CSA will collaborate with H-California in the following capacities:

* Shared news items, syndicated between the CSA blog and the H-California listserv.

* Promoting resources, events, and projects between the two resources.

We strongly encourage CSA members and our community to join the H-California listserv, an automated email discussion board of all news and events related to humanities scholarship in California. The CSA will list all our news, events, blog postings, and official communication on the H-California listserv.

 

FEATURED EVENT: Laborfest 2008: Film Festival, Music, Talks, Tours Around the Bay Area (July 5 to 31)

Below, I have given a brief listing of the events. For full descriptions, visit the Laborfest site and the external sites for each event.–ed.

July 5 (Saturday) 2:00 PM ($7.00) -Roxie Theatre 3117 16th St., SF
International Working Class Film & Video Festival
Sacco and Vanzetti (82 min) 2006
By Peter Miller
http://www.willowpondfilms.com/sacco_and_vanzetti.html

Eugene Debs & The American Movement
(43 min) 1977
By Cambridge Documentary Films
http://www.cambridgedocumentaryfilms.org/debs.html#

July 5 (Saturday) 7:00, 9.00 PM ($8.00) – Victoria Theatre – 2961 16th Street, at Mission, San Francisco
LaborFest ‘08 Opening Night
International Working Class Film & Video Festival

July 5 (Saturday) 12:00 Noon ($15 to $50 sliding scale donation to CounterPULSE). Bring a bag lunchMeet at 1310 Mission St. at 9th, SF
Labor Bike Tour with Chris Carlson of San Francisco’s labor history.
For more info: call Chris Carlsson (415) 608 9035 carlsson.chris@gmail.com

July 6 (Sunday) 10:00 AM (Free) – Meet at the corner of 330 Ellis St., at Glide Memorial Church, SF
SF Anti-War History Walk
By Historian David Giesen
For more information: telekosmos@yahoo.com, 415-948-4265

July 6 (Sunday) 11:00 AM (Free) – Meet at Coit Tower entrance
Coit Tower Walk & WPA Murals Presentation
By Mark R. Johnson
http://www.art-for-a-change.com/exhibits/atwork.htm
http://gosanfrancisco.about.com/od/touristattractions/ig/SF-s-Coit-Tower/Coit-Tower—Full-Shot.htm

July 6 (Sunday) 2:00 PM ($7.00) -Roxie Theatre 3117 16th St., SF
International Working Class Film & Video Festival
Un Poquito De Tanta Verdad (A Little Bit of So Much Truth) (93 min) 2007 By Jill Friedberg.
http://www.corrugate.org

July 6 Dear Mandela (6 min) 2007
By Dara Kell & Christopher Nizza
http://sleepinggiantfilms.wordpress.com

July 6 The Deported (22 min) 2007 By Musgtaque Ahmed (Mahbub), Korean Migrant Media
http://www.mfasia.org/mfaStatements/Statement15-KCTUActionAlert.html
migrantact@gmail.com

July 6 (Sunday) 3:00 PM (Donation) – ILWU Local 6 Hall 255-9th St. near Howard, SF
Postal Workers Video & Forum – Managers Going Postal: Letter Carriers Speak Out!
Video Postal Management Going Postal (20 min) wil be shown.

July 7 (Monday) 5:30 PM (Free) – SEIU 1021 HALL 350 Rhode Island Suite 100, SF
Opening Reception for Labor Art Show
http://www.arthazelwood.com/

July 7 (Monday) 7:00 PM (Free) – Modern Times Bookstore 888 Valencia St., at 20th St., SF
The Search For A Civic Voice, California Latino Politicds
Book reading by Kenneth Burt
http://www.kennethburt.com/index.html

July 8 (Tuesday) 7:00 PM (Free) -Labor Archives & Research Center, SFSU 480 Winston Dr., SF
The Federal Theater Project & It’s Work
Presentation by Joel Schechter
http://userwww.sfsu.edu/~jschech/

July 9 (Wednesday) 7:00 PM (Free) -Modern Times Bookstore 888 Valencia St. at 20th St., SF
Outside The Box: Corporate Media, Globalization, & The UPS Strike
Presentation by Deepa Kumar
http://www.scils.rutgers.edu/~dkumar/book.htm

July 10 (Thursday) 5:00, 8:00 PM ($7.00) -Roxie Theatre 3117 16th St., SF
International Working Class Film & Video Festival
The International / Beynelmilel (106 min) 2006 West coast Premier
By Muharrem Gulmez & Sirri Sureyya Onder (Turkey)

4857 (The Life in Tuzla Shipyards) (30 min) 2008 US Premier
By Petra Holzer, Selçuk Erzurumlu, Ethem Özgüven Kurgu (Turkey)
http://4857-documentary.blogspot.com/
petramh@gmail.com

July 10 (Thursday) 6:30 PM (Donation) -Ironworkers Hall, South Bay Labor Council -2102 Almaden Road, Room 110, San Jose
Overworked and Underpaid in the Silicon Valley
Forum & Presentation: learn about how the South Bay labor

July 11 (Friday) 7:00 PM (Donation) -Niebyl Proctor Marxist Library 6501 Telegraph Ave., Oakland
International Working Class Film & Video Festival
The International / Beynelmilel (106 min) 2006
By Muharrem Gulmez & Sirri Sureyya Onder (Turkey)
Please check the detail on July 10.

July 11, 12 7:30 PM, July 11, 12 2:00, 7:30 PM (Donation for St. Boniface in community service & help for the homeless.) St. Boniface Theater -175 Golden Gate Ave., SF
I Remember Mama (A Play)

July 12 (Saturday) 10:00 AM (Free) Meet at Harry Bridges Plaza – Front of Ferry Building, SF
San Francisco General Strike Walk
With labor historian Louis Prisco

July 12 (Saturday) 12:00 Noon (Free) SF Main Library – Koret Auditoriium – 100 Larkin St., at Grove
New Deal Films and Presentations
With Harvey Smith, Gray Brechin and others.
For information call (510) 649-7395

July 12 (Saturday) 12:00 – 1:00, 3:00 – 4:00 PM (Free – however, you need to pay to go into the pier) Hyde Street Pier – Hyde and Jefferson St., SF
Living History: SF Waterfront Strike 1901

July 12 (Saturday) 2:00 PM (Free) Phoenix Theatre Annex – 414 Mason St., 4th Floor, at Geary St., SF
Appalachian Redneck (A Play) World Premier
Play by Edward Hernandez

July 12 (Saturday) 7:00 PM (Free) ILWU Local 6 Hall -255 9th St., near Howard, SF8
1968 – 2008 The Global Lessons From ‘68
With Mehmet Bayron, David Ewing, Dahrm Paul, Anatol Anton & others

July 12 (Saturday) 8:00 PM (Free) -885 Clayton St., at Carl St., SF
Song and Poetry Swap

July 13 (Sunday) 10:00 AM (Free) Chinese Historical Society -965 Clay St., SF
Chinatown Labor Walk
Presentation by Charlie Chin

July 13 (Sunday) 1:00 PM (Free) Meet at North East corner of Shattuck & Haste, Berkeley
Berkeley Walk with Richard Schwartz

July 13 (Sunday) 1:30 PM (Free) Meet at Post & Steiner , in front of the mural (Evolution of the Blues), SF
The Black Community & The Western Addition – A Walking History
With local historian Al Williams and Bobbie Webb

July 13 (Sunday) 2:00 PM ($7.00) -Roxie Theatre 3117 16th St., SF
International Working Class Film & Video Festival
To Die In Madrid (58 min) 1963 By Frederic Rossif

Into The Fire – American Women In The Spanish Civil War
(58 min) 2002 By Julia Newman (She will be attending)

July 13 (Sunday) 5:00 PM (Free) City Lights Bookstore 261 Columbus at Broadway, SF
LaborFest Writers Workshop and Waterfront Writers
Also a writer of the waterfront M.C. Warrior will read.

July 13 (Sunday) 7:00 PM ($7.00) -Roxie Theatre 3117 16th St., SF
International Working Class Film & Video Festival
Dare To Struggle, Dare To Win (96 min) 1968 By Jean-Pierre Thorn

July 14 (Monday) 6:00 PM ($7.00) -Roxie Theatre 3117 16th St., SF
International Working Class Film & Video Festival
In The Year Of The Pig (103 min) 1968 By Emile de Antonio

Blow For Blow / Coup Pour Coup (90 min) 1972 By Marin Karmitz

July 14 (Monday) 7:00 PM (Free) Modern Times Bookstore 888 Valencia St., at 20th St., SF
Centennial of The Great White Fleet
A reading with writer and labor archivist Lincoln Cushing and others.

July 15 (Tuesday) 10:00 AM (Free) SF Main Library Meet on 6th floor near the New Deal Exhibit
The New Deal Exhibition

July 15 (Tuesday) 5:00 PM ($7.00) -Roxie Theatre 3117 16th St., SF
International Working Class Film & Video Festival
US Premier
Not Just A Matter of Saving Our Skins / Utoia and IG Metal (81 min) 2007 (Germany)
By Holger Wegemann

July 15 (Tuesday) 6:30 PM (Free) Red Hill Bookstore 401 Cortland Ave., SF
The Social and Political History of Bernal Heights
Presentation by Molly Martin & Terry Milne

July 15 (Tuesday) 7:00 PM (Free) West Portal Public Library 190 Lenox Way, SF
The New Deal In The Sunset District
Presentation by Gray Brechin

July 15 (Tuesday) 7:00 PM ($7.00) -Roxie Theatre 3117 16th St., SF
International Working Class Film & Video Festival
9/11 Dust and Deceit at The World Trade Center (59 min) 2007
By Penny Little (She will be attendin)

The Toxic Clouds of 9/11: A Looming Health Disaster (66 min) 2006
By allison Johnson

Trade unionist John Sferazo from Iron Workers Local 361 and IUOE Local 138 will attend and discuss his efforts to defend the first responders.

July 16 (Wednesday) 7:00 PM (Free) Modern Times Bookstore 888 Valencia St., at 20th St.
Red State Rebels

July 16 (Wednesday) 5:00 PM ($7.00) -Roxie Theatre 3117 16th St., SF
International Working Class Film & Video Festival
Water Front (53 min) 2007
By Liz Miller

July 16 (Wednesday) 7:00 PM ($7.00) -Roxie Theatre 3117 16th St., SF
International Working Class Film & Video Festival
Lock Out (56 min) 2007 (Australia)
By Jason Van Genderen

The Archive Project – The Realist Film Unit in Australia (98 min) 2006 (Australia)
By John Hughes

July 17 (Thursday) 5:00 PM ($7.00) -Roxie Theatre 3117 16th St., SF
International Working Class Film & Video Festival
SF Mess (42 min) 2008
By Greg Rodgers

Our Families, Our Community, Our Union (12 min) 2007
By Jano Oscherwitz

Justice Can’t Be Temporary (8 min) 2007
By Jano Oscherwitz & Octavio Velarde, SEIU 1021 Organizer

July 17 (Thursday) 7:00 PM ($7.00) -Roxie Theatre 3117 16th St., SF
International Working Class Film & Video Festival
The Ghosts Of Duffy’s Cut (52 min) 2006 Ireland West Coast Premier
Producer: Dave Farrell, Directors: Stephen Rooke & Ruan Magan

The Equal Pay Story:Scenes From A Turbulent History
(29 min) 2008 U.K. US Premier
Directed by Jenny Morgan, Produced by Jo Morris

Labor Music Videos Shorts By Chris Cambell, member Boilermakers Local 146 Canada
Shut Down Blues Canada (2007) 5 minutes, Gotta Be Safe Canada (2007) 4 minutes, There’s A Wild One Going On Canada (2007) 4:42 minutes With singer Renee Gibbon and Writer Daniel Cassidy

July 18 (Friday) 7:00 PM (Donation) –Niebyl Proctor Marxist Library 6501 Telegraph Ave., Oakland
International Working Class Film & Video Festival
Eugene Debs & The American Movement (43 min) 1977
By Cambridge Documentary Films

San Francisco State On Strike (20 min) 1968
This film shows the struggle of the students and teachers in the 6 months long strike at San Francisco State University.

July 18 (Friday) 7:00 PM ($5.00/Donation)
SF Community Music Center 544 Capp St., SF
Concert of The Choruses & Show Me Where It Hurts

July 19 (Saturday) 9:30 – 5 :00 PM (Free) Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts 2868 Mission St., near 25th St., SF
Labor BookFair

July 19 (Saturday) 9:30 AM (Free) Meet at Berkeley High School Main Entrance on Milvia in Berkeley
The East Bay Schools, The New Deal & The Education Crisis Today (Presentation & Walk)
With Harvey Smith, Fred Glass, Oakland Education Association (OEA) and Berkeley Federation of Teachers (BFT) representatives.

July 19 (Saturday) 7:00 PM (Free) Modern Times Bookstore 888 Valencia St., at 20th St., SF
Black Workers, Hanging Nooses & The State of The Labor Movement
Panel discussion with Leo Robinson, Carl Bryant, Fernando Gapasin, Jack Heyman and others

July 19 (Saturday) 7:00 PM (Free) Harrington’s Bar & Grille 245 Front Street, Downtown San Francisco
Danny Cassidy Benefit Fund

.July 20 (Sunday) 10:00 AM (Free)
The Redstone Building 16th Street at Capp, SF
The Redstone Walk – Labor, Art & The Politics of The Mission Dist.
By Louis Prisco

July 20 (Sunday) 5:00 PM ($35.00) Terminal E South side of the ferry building, SF (End of the Market Street)
Boat Tour – Building Bridges and Labor Maritime History

July 21 (Monday) 7:00 PM (Free) Modern Times Bookstore 888 Valencia St., at 20th St., SF
1968 The Emergence of The Women’s Liberation Movement & Its Relationship to Working Women
With Chude Pam Allen and Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz

July 21 (Monday) 7:30 PM ($5.00 donation to actors) Fellowship of Humanity Hall 370 27th St., Oakland
Compared To What? (A play reading)
By Judith Offer
For further information, call Anniversary Productions at (510) 444-8521.

July 22 (Tuesday) 7:00 PM (Free) ILWU Local 6 Hall 255 9th St. near Howard, SF
Will Call Center Servicing Solve Labor’s ‘Customer Satisfaction’ Problems?
A presentation by labor journalist Steve Early and others.

July 23 (Wednesday) 7:00 PM (Free) Modern Times Bookstore 888 Valencia St. at 20th St., SF
Workin’ Man Blues, Country Music In California
Book reading by Gerald Halsom

July 24 (Thursday) 7:00 PM (Free) ILWU Local 10 Henry Schmidt room 400 North Point at Mason, SF
The Lessons of May Day ‘08
With video screening of May Day 2008 action
No Peace, No Work, ILWU Shuts Down West Coast Ports To Protest War
(20 min) 2008 by Labor Video Project

July 25 (Friday) 7:00 PM (Donation) -Niebyl Proctor Marxist Library 6501 Telegraph Ave., Oakland
International Working Class Film & Video Festival
Un Poquito De Tanta Verdad (A Little Bit of So Much Truth) (93 min) 2007
By Jill Friedberg

July 25 (Friday) 7:00 PM (Free) ILWU Local 6 Hall 255 9th St. near Howard, SF
The Film Movement of ‘68 & Independent Media Today
Panel with Connie Field and Peter Gessner

July 26 (Saturday) 10:00 AM (Free) Latham Square Telegraph and Broadway, Oakland
Oakland 1946 General Strike Walk
With Karin Hart of the Labor Studies Program at Laney College and Gifford Hartman of the Flying Picket Historical Society.

July 26 (Saturday) 12:00 Noon to 2:30 PM (Free) Yerba Buena Center 701 Mission Street at 3rd St., SF Syndicate
A walking tour of sidewalk art installations which nod to the history of labor unions at performing arts venues in San Francisco. This tour will be led by Jessica Tully, Kim Munson and historians from the Labor Archives and Research Center.

July 26 (Saturday) 2:00 PM (Free) Niebyl Proctor Marxist Library 6501 Telegraph Ave., Oakland
Workers’ Power In The Present

July 26 (Saturday) 2:00 PM (Free) UCSF (Detailed location will be posted shortly)
From New Orleans & Katrina to Public Health Hospitals in The Bay Area (The Struggle to Defend Public Healthcare & Our Hospitals)
Presenting will be: Brad Ott, Chair Of The Committee To Reopen Charity Hospital Mary Ann Ring, UCSF CUE Local 6, Dr. Jill Atoine UCSF, Dr. Michael Freece St. Lukes Hospital Pediatrics

July 26 (Saturday) 7:00 PM ($5.00/Donation) SEIU 1021 HALL 350 Rhode Island, SF (Enter on Kansas between 16th & 17th)
Music From The WPA
Music From The WPA with The San Francisco Bay Area Labor Heritage Rockin’ Solidarity Chorus, Jack Chernos, Carol Denney and others.

July 27 (Sunday) 10:00 AM ($15.00) Civic Center Between Asian Art Museum & Main Library, SF
WPA Bus Tour
Join Gray Brechin and Harvey Smith

July 27 (Sunday) 2:00 PM (Donation) San Jose State University – Martin Luther King Library Room 255
From The South Bay To New Orleans & The Spirit of 1929 with Videos, Music & Food
With screening of Streetcar Stories about the transit strike in New Orleans in 1929.
By Michael Mizell-Nelson, speakers on Gulf Coast Reconstruction and The Fight to Reopen Charity Hospital with Brad Ott.

July 27 (Sunday) 4:00 – 6:00 PM ($5.00/Donation) 522 Valencia St., at 16th st., SF
SF Living Wage Coalition – Dinner, Raffle & Film

July 27 (Sunday) 7:00 PM (Donation) La Pena Cultural Center – 3105 Shattuck at Prince, Berkeley
Folk This! And Friends

July 28 (Monday) 6:00 PM (Free) Plumbers Hall – 1621 Market St. at Franklin, SF
San Francisco Labor Council Film Screening
Labor & Work In The History of San Francisco
Film showing by Rick Prelinger of Prelinger Library

July 29 (Tuesday) 7:00 PM (Free) ILWU Local 6 Hall – 255 9th St. near Howard, SF
SF State Strike & It’s Relevance Today
Screening of San Francisco State On Strike 1968 20 min.,

July 29 (Tuesday) 7:00 PM (Free) Modern Times Bookstore – 888 Valencia St. at 20th, SF (Please note that the date has been changed)
Wobblies On The Waterfront: Interracial Unionism In Progressive Era Philadelphia
Book reading by Peter Cole

July 31 (Thursday) 7:00 PM (Donation) Nap’s 3152 Mission St. at Precita, SF
Closing Party

 

CALL for Submissions/Proposals: California Council for the Humaniteis Oral History and Documentary (Deadlines July 1 and Oct. 1)

The California Council for the Humanities offers grants in three areas: the “California Stories” oral history grant, the California Documentary Project, and the Youth Digital Filmmakers. They are currently accepting submissions for the documentary and oral history projects.

Youth Digital Filmmakers is our grant line supporting projects that engage California youth in creating short films about how they see California. Eight projects received funding in June 2007. The films will be screened in spring 2008. The program is part of the Council’s youth-based campaign, “California Stories: How I See It.”

The California Story Fund is our grant line supporting public humanities projects that bring to light new and compelling stories from California’s diverse communities. The guidelines for the July 2008 round of funding for the California Story Fund are now available. An online application will be posted on June 2, with proposals due July 1

The California Documentary Project supports documentary film, video, radio and new media projects that explore and interpret subjects relevant to California’s past, present or future. Applicants may apply for a Research and Development Grant, a Production Grant, or a New Media Grant. The deadline for each grant is October 1, 2008.

 

FILM/DISCUSSION: “La Pulga” Documents the Closure of the San Jose Flea Market (Friday, June 13 in San Jose)

From Jaime Contreras, Generation Engage.

GENERATION ENGAGE AND MACLA PRESENT PREMIERE SCREENING OF LA PULGA, A DOCUMENTARY OF THE SAN JOSE FLEA MARKET

City of San Jose Council Member, Hispanic Champer of Commerce President, and Flee Market Vendors to Participate in Community Forum Following Screening

Join GenerationEngage and MACLA for the world premiere screening of the film La Pulga, which chronicles, memorializes, and highlights the historic and cultural significance of the San Jose Flea Market, the first and largest flea market in the United States. Before San Jose became the technology capital of the world, the city was known for its Flea Market, which is slated to close in 2010 to be replaced by a BART Corridor urban village. Through interviews with the owner of the flea market, activists, vendors, and city officials, the film explores the conflicts between an existing community’s economic vitality and an environmentally responsible land use plan and reveals the complexity of urban issues and social justice in a changing city.

A panel discussion and community forum will follow.

La Pulga was directed by Rene Picazo, and produced by Henry Servin and Alina Kwak.

WHO: City of San Jose Council Member Kansen Chu, District 4; President, Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, Dennis King; Activist, Chris Lepe; Jesus Banda, San Jose Flea Market Vendor.

WHAT: Students, twenty-somethings, and community members discuss development issues with expert panel after watching world premiere of La Pulga.

WHEN: Friday June 13, 2008

6:30-7pm – Opening
7-7:45pm – Screening of La Pulga
8-9:00pm – Panel Discussion and Community Forum

WHERE: MACLA Castellano Playhouse, 510 South 1st Street, San Jose, CA 95113 Click here for directions.

 

FILM: “Hecho in Los Angeles” A Look at LA Garment Workers, Thursday May 8, in San Francisco

From FlavorpillSF, a great calendar of A&E.

Thursday, May 8, 2008. 7:30PM $6

Hecho en Los Angeles (MADE IN L.A.)

A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition Film Series

a documentary about the immigrant workers struggle in honor of InternationalWorkers’ Day.

Made in L.A. traces the moving transformation of three Latina garment workers on the fault lines of global economic change who decide they must resist. Through a groundbreaking law suit and consumer boycott, they fight to establish an important legal and moral precedent holding an American retailer liable for the labor conditions under which its products are manufactured. But more than this, Made in LA provides an insider’s view into both the struggles of recent immigrants and into the organizing process itself: the enthusiasm, discouragement, hard-won victories and ultimate self-empowerment.

As director Carracedo concludes: “These women’s struggle mattered not just for its own sake but because it served as a catalyst for each of them, in her own way, to stand up and say: ‘I exist. I have rights.’” 70 min., 2007, Spanish and English with bilingual subtitles.

© 2006 Artists’ Television Access, 992 Valencia Street, San Francisco, CA 94110, (415) 824-3890. Artists’ Television Access is supported in part by Grants for the Arts/San Francisco Hotel Tax Fund, the San Francisco Foundation, SF Weekly, individual donors, and volunteers.

 

FILM: Barry Jenkins’s “Medicine” Takes on Race in San Francisco

The San Francisco International Film Festival began on April 24 and lasts until May 8th.

The festival website gives a plot summary of Jenkins’s “Medicine for Melancholy.”

“After hooking up at a party, Jo (Tracey Heggins) considers her alcohol-fueled one-night stand with Micah (Wyatt Cenac) history, but he is eager to explore the possibility of a deeper connection. On the surface, they have little in common other than both being twentysomething and African American. For Jo, self-assured but still trying to find her place in the world, race is just one lens through which to see the world, while Micah proves obsessed with the subject. After Jo eventually agrees to spend her Sunday with him, afternoon turns to evening as the initial sparks flare once more. Their intimacy grows, along with an air of pensive reflection as each challenges the other’s assumptions, core beliefs and sense of identity. Gorgeously shot in muted tones on the streets of San Francisco, through neighborhoods ranging from the tony Marina to the gritty Tenderloin, what begins as a bittersweet, erotic romance between near strangers evolves into a complex tale with wider implications. The couple’s visit to the Museum of the African Diaspora becomes richly ironic, especially for Micah, who is only too aware of the ongoing African American exodus from the city. As they wander around town, their conversation encompasses the personal and political, touching on issues of race, class, assimilation and gentrification. It is part of the strength of Barry Jenkins’s thoughtful feature debut that these larger issues never dwarf Jo and Micah’s own journey, one that over a scant 24 hours leaves them both reflective and bursting with new perceptions.” —Pam Grady

SHOWTIMES

Wed, Apr 30 / 9:15 / Kabuki / MEDI30K
Sun, May 4 / 8:15 / PFA / MEDI04P
Wed, May 7 / 3:30 / Kabuki / MEDI07K

 

Anthology of Reviews: Blood or Oil? Paul Thomas Anderson and Upton Sinclair

In a March truthout editorial, writer David Bacon attacked Paul Thomas Anderson’s film adaptation of Upton Sinclair’s novel, Oil!. In There Will Be Blood, Bacon writes, Anderson evacuated the film of radicalism and the labor movement in early Southern California surrounding the big capital of the booming oil industry.

Anthony Arthur, author of the 2006 biography, Radical Innocent: Upton Sinclair, commented in the Times on the absence of the young radical character, Paul, in the movie version. He suggests that both the quest for oil riches and the business of saving souls offer less social commentary in Anderson’s adaptation, which he regards as “misanthropic” in the depiction of Daniel Day Lewis’s character, Daniel Plainview. Nowhere, as in the novel, suggests Aurthur, appears the historical backdrop of Bolshevism, WW I, the Red Scare, Teapot Dome, and the evangelical movement in Southern California epitomized by Aimee Semple McPherson.

Spencer Dew, a doctoral candidate at the University of Chicago Divinity School, wrote in The Dallas Morning News about Anderson and Sinclair’s take on the relationship between capital and religion: in the movie and the novel Plainview and Eli are salesmen. Between the lines the film may contain Sinclair’s social commentary, but Dew writes that the novelist’s vision of Eli puts more light on wealth’s corruption (or perversion) of the socialist project of Christian spirituality.

In The New Yorker David Denby gave an exuberant endorsement of the film and offered stylistic commentary on the differences between Oil! and There Will Be Blood. “[T]he young writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson has now done work that bears comparison to the greatest achievements of Griffith and Ford,” writes Denby. Instead of giving Anderson demerits for his bleak vision of Plainview and Eli’s project, Denby gives him credit for re-visioning the novel by collapsing the mythic and the socio-historical. “‘Blood’ has the pulse of the future in its rhythms. Like the most elegiac Western, this movie is about the vanishing American frontier. The thrown-together buildings look scraggly and unkempt, the homesteaders are modest, stubborn, and reticent, but, in their undreamed-of future, Wal-Mart is on the way . . . . Anderson has set up a kind of allegory of American development in which two overwhelming forces—entrepreneurial capitalism and evangelism—both operate on the border of fraudulence; together, they will build Southern California . . . ” In August 2006 Denby wrote in the magazine a lengthy review of two biographies of Sinclair, one by Anthony Arthur and the other by Kevin Mattson.

In Religion Dispatches, S. Brent Plate, a professor of visual studies and religion at Texas Christian University, regards There Will Be Blood as a mythological origin story, and compares Plainview and Eli to Cain and Abel. He draws the title of his essay, “There Will Be a Nation,” from D.W. Griffith’s own origin story.

The Economist remarked on the American progressive tradition of railing against oil interests, using Sinclair and Anderson as vehicles for the discussion.

Though he admits to not having read Oil!, Slate’s Timothy Noah says that Anderson’s film should have taken a social cue from Sinclair’s didactic strategy, and adopted an overt critique.

A few sources for studying Upton Sinclair:

His book, The Profits of Religion: A Study of Supernaturalism as a Source of Income and a Shield of Privilege, can be found here.

The Virtual Museum of the City of San Francisco has some information and primary documents available on Sinclair.

The New York Times articles on Sinclair and Blood.