MIX NYC is a not-for-profit organization based in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

and dedicated to

queer ''Queer'' is an umbrella term for people who are not heterosexual or cisgender. Originally meaning or , ''queer'' came to be used pejoratively against those with same-sex desires or relationships in the late 19th century. Beginning in the l ...

experimental film Experimental film or avant-garde cinema is a mode of filmmaking that rigorously re-evaluates cinematic conventions and explores non-narrative forms or alternatives to traditional narratives or methods of working. Many experimental films, parti ...

. It is also known as the "MIX festival," for its most visible program, the annual New York Lesbian and Gay Experimental Film Festival (NYLGEFF), which has featured early works by filmmakers such as

Christine Vachon Christine Vachon (; born November 21, 1962) is an American film producer active in the American independent film sector. Christine Vachon produced Todd Haynes' first feature, ''Poison'', which was awarded the Grand Jury Prize at the 1991 Sundan ...

Todd Haynes Todd Haynes (; born January 2, 1961) is an American film director, screenwriter, and producer. His films span four decades with themes examining the personalities of well-known musicians, dysfunctional and dystopian societies, and blurred gender ...

, Isaac Julien,

Thomas Allen Harris Thomas Allen Harris is a critically acclaimed, interdisciplinary artist who explores family, identity, and spirituality in a participatory practice. Since 1990, Harris has remixed archives from multiple origins throughout his work, challenging hie ...

Barbara Hammer Barbara Jean Hammer (May 15, 1939 – March 16, 2019) was an American feminist film director, producer, writer, and cinematographer. She is known for being one of the pioneers of the lesbian film genre, and her career spanned over 50 years. Hamm ...

Jonathan Caouette Jonathan Caouette (born November 26, 1972) is an American film director, writer, editor and actor. Film career Caouette is the director and editor of '' Tarnation'' (2003), an autobiographical documentary, that premiered at the Sundance and Ca ...

, Jennie Livingston, and Matthew Mishory.

History

1980s

MIX was founded in 1987 by

Sarah Schulman Sarah Miriam Schulman (born July 28, 1958) is an American novelist, playwright, nonfiction writer, screenwriter, gay activist, and AIDS historian. She is a Distinguished Professor of the Humanities at College of Staten Island (CSI) and a Fellow a ...

and Jim Hubbard. The festival was created because newly emerging Gay Film Festivals were not including formally inventive work, and the then vibrant experimental film venues marginalized gay and lesbian work. They were aided by curators Jack Waters and Peter Cramer from Naked Eye Cinema and Ela Troyano who programmed The New York Film Festival Downtown. The first festival featured the world premiere of Su Freidrich's ''Damned If You Don't'', and from then on the festival became a showcase for new works by established makers, archival masters like

Barbara Rubin Barbara Rubin (1945–1980) was an American filmmaker and performance artist. She is best known for her landmark 1963 underground film ''Christmas on Earth''. Life and career Barbara Rubin grew up in the Cambria Heights neighborhood of Queens, ...

's ''Christmas on Earth'', and new emerging artists. Quickly, in concert with the emerging AIDS Activist and Queer Activist movement of the day- The New York Lesbian & Gay Experimental Film Festival (NYLGEFF) became a mass cultural event in the LGBT underground. Friday nights were guaranteed sold-out "Lesbian Date Nights" and a counter-culture of new interest in

filmmaking Filmmaking (film production) is the process by which a motion picture is produced. Filmmaking involves a number of complex and discrete stages, starting with an initial story, idea, or commission. It then continues through screenwriting, cast ...

and

video production Video production is the process of producing video content for video. It is the equivalent of filmmaking, but with video recorded either as analog signals on videotape, digitally in video tape or as computer files stored on optical discs, hard dri ...

emerged around the festival community. MIX soon became very influential on other programming venues, often contributing significant work to The Whitney Biennial,

Berlin International Film Festival The Berlin International Film Festival (german: Internationale Filmfestspiele Berlin), usually called the Berlinale (), is a major international film festival held annually in Berlin, Germany. Founded in 1951 and originally run in June, the fest ...

and other important screens. MIX exhibited first films by major lesbian, gay and bisexual filmmakers including

' college thesis film, ''Assassins: A Film Concerning Rimbaud,'' (which got him his first review, ever),

Maria Maggenti Maria Maggenti (born c. 1962) is an American film director and screenwriter for film and television, who has traditionally created independent films. She was the script editor for the American television series, ''Without a Trace'' (2003) and has ...

's ''Name Day'', the first screening of ''

Paris Is Burning Paris Is Burning may refer to: * ''Paris Is Burning'' (film), a 1990 documentary film * "Paris Is Burning" (''Gilmore Girls''), the eleventh episode of ''Gilmore Girls first season * "Paris Is Burning", a song from the 1983 album '' Breaking the Ch ...

'', when it was still on a dual system,

's first film, and many others. Hubbard and Schulman prioritized artists' fees, paying all makers equally regardless of the length of their work, since in experimental film, labor intensivity was not determined by length. They included the first focus on films by and about black gay men in any film Festival. Schulman and Hubbard worked long and hard to get press review coverage for gay experimental work, often holding individual press screenings at the critic's convenience. They hand wheatpasted posters on buildings around the city, and leafleted areas where gay people hung out, like the piers and bars. MIX received no funding and managed to break even on enthusiastic box office support. They showed gay experimental film from other countries and brought films by hand to venues around the US, Europe and Japan. The festival has shown the work of filmmakers such as

Nisha Ganatra Nisha Ganatra (born June 25, 1974) is a Canadian-American film director, screenwriter, producer, and actress of Indian descent. She wrote, directed, and produced the independent comedy drama ''Chutney Popcorn'' (1999) and later directed the indepe ...

Teri Rice Teri is a given name directly from Teresa. Notable people with the name include: * Teri Ann Linn (born 1961), American actress and singer * Teri Anulewicz, American politician * Teri Austin (born 1957), Canadian actress * Teri Byrne (born 1972) ...

, and Isaac Julien among hundreds more. As makers began to die of AIDS, Jim became active in film preservation, beginning with the film ''Avocada'' by the late Bill Vehr of the Ridiculous Theatrical Company. Eventually, he preserved over 2,000 hours of AIDS Film and Video, now available for free viewing at the

New York Public Library The New York Public Library (NYPL) is a public library system in New York City. With nearly 53 million items and 92 locations, the New York Public Library is the second largest public library in the United States (behind the Library of Congress) ...

. During Sarah and Jim's tenure, no one was ever turned away from MIX due to inability to pay. The festival also included Transsexual work from the very first year, with Marguerite Paris's film ''All Women Are Equal''. They found ways of getting works by makers like Chantal Ackerman who did not show in gay festivals. Among many fabulous moments in the festival's history was MIX's screening of

Andy Warhol Andy Warhol (; born Andrew Warhola Jr.; August 6, 1928 – February 22, 1987) was an American visual artist, film director, and producer who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art. His works explore the relationsh ...

's '' Blow Job'' which was attended by Kitty Carlisle Hart in a gown with a tuxedo'd escort.

1990s

Hubbard & Schulman ran the festival together as a community event from 1987-1991. After the 1991 festival, Schulman wanted to devote more time to her writing. The 1992 festival was organized by Hubbard and filmmakers Marguerite Paris and Jerry Tartaglia. That year also introduced shows programmed by guest curators, who brought new perspectives to the line-up. Notable shows included Our Fanzine Friends, which drew upon the hot trend of queer zines, featuring work by

Glenn Belverio Glenn Belverio (born 1975) is an American journalist and editor based in New York, New York. In the 1990s, Belverio was a filmmaker and performance artist, whose 1993 collaboration with best-selling author Camille Paglia on the short film ''Glenn ...

and

Bruce LaBruce Bruce LaBruce (born January 3, 1964) is a Canadian artist, writer, filmmaker, photographer, and underground director based in Toronto. Life and career LaBruce was born in Tiverton, Ontario. He has claimed both Justin Stewart and Bryan Bruce as ...

; and ''Fire'', featuring work from the African diaspora. This last program featured work by Dawn Suggs, Shari Frilot, Thomas Allen Harris and others. In 1993 Frilot and Karim Ainouz were the co-directors, and introduced many changes, including the name MIX, the production of a catalog (instead of handing our program notes), a new venue (

The Kitchen The Kitchen is a non-profit, multi-disciplinary avant-garde performance and experimental art institution located at 512 West 19th Street, between Tenth and Eleventh Avenues in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. It was foun ...

instead of

Anthology Film Archives Anthology Film Archives is an international center for the preservation, study, and exhibition of film and video, with a particular focus on independent, experimental, and avant-garde cinema.Victoria Theater in

Harlem Harlem is a neighborhood in Upper Manhattan, New York City. It is bounded roughly by the Hudson River on the west; the Harlem River and 155th Street on the north; Fifth Avenue on the east; and Central Park North on the south. The greater Ha ...

, in addition to its downtown programs at NYU's Cantor Film Center and the

Knitting Factory The Knitting Factory is a nightclub in New York City that features eclectic music and entertainment. After opening in 1987, various other locations were opened in the United States. The Knitting Factory gave its audience poetry readings, perform ...

. Frilot headed MIX through 1996. Her other legacy was a commitment to installation work and the nascent digital realm. Installations were on view in 1993, on the upper floor of the Kitchen. But in 1994, Shu Lea Cheang and Beth Stryker curated Cyberqueer, in the basement galleries of Anthology. Although installations were presented in subsequent years, they never matched these early efforts until new MIX NYC staff began devoting substantial space and resources to installations in 2006. Frilot went on to become a curator at the Sundance Film Festival. Rajendra Roy was in charge in 1997, when the festival moved to Cinema Village, which was then a single-screen theater on E. 12th Street. In 1997 Ernesto Foronda and Maïa Cybelle Carpenter were programming coordinators for the festival. Carpenter stayed on until 1999, also curating additional programs in the years to follow. Roy brought on Anie Stanley as artistic director in 1998, and as a team they propelled MIX to greater visibility, with more corporate sponsorship, but with less emphasis on the identity politics of the early 1990s. 1998 also saw a sidebar of 8 mm films curated by Stephen Kent Jusick, featuring work by both contemporary makers and old masters, such as Jack Smith, and

's Polavision home movies. Roy is now the Celeste Bartos Chief Curator of Film at The Museum of Modern Art.

2000s

Roy & Stanley stepped down after the 2000 festival, making way for Ioannis Mookas, who took the title of Executive Director. The organization, whose offices had been in the financial district, suffered after 9/11, and Mookas left after overseeing two festivals. MIX NYC as an organization took a new direction in 2003, when it initiated the ACT UP Oral History Project, run by Hubbard and Schulman (www.actuporalhistory.org), and funded by a grant from the Ford Foundation. This new effort gave the organization another aspect, different from being just a film festival. Larry Shea and Stephen Winter took the helm of the festival in 2003.

's Tarnation was shepherded into being under Winter's supervision, and its premiere as the festival centerpiece was the beginning of its illustrious path to

Cannes Cannes ( , , ; oc, Canas) is a city located on the French Riviera. It is a commune located in the Alpes-Maritimes department, and host city of the annual Cannes Film Festival, Midem, and Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. The ...

, the

New York Film Festival The New York Film Festival (NYFF) is a film festival held every fall in New York City, presented by Film at Lincoln Center (FLC). Founded in 1963 by Richard Roud and Amos Vogel with the support of Lincoln Center president William Schuman, i ...

and a distribution deal with Wellspring in 2004. Shea and Winter also reimagined the 1000 Dreams of Desire program from 1993, re-staging it, with differences, at the same Ann Street location as the original. This time, in addition to the video booths and screening room on the upper floors, the basement was also cleared out, and set up with DJs, ambient 16mm & 8mm film projections, and a dance floor. A large-scale installation called ''Cake'', about garment workers, by Mary Ellen Strom & Ann Carlson, debuted at

South Street Seaport The South Street Seaport is a historic area in the New York City borough of Manhattan, centered where Fulton Street meets the East River, and adjacent to the Financial District, in Lower Manhattan. The Seaport is a designated historic district ...

as the festival centerpiece. MIX expanded beyond the concept of the annual festival more in late 2004, with the introduction of MIXtv, which aired weekly on

Manhattan Neighborhood Network Manhattan Neighborhood Network (MNN) is an American non-profit organization that broadcasts programming on five public-access television cable TV stations in Manhattan, New York City. The country’s largest community media center, MNN operates tw ...

. Yet MIX was unable to capitalize on the success of Tarnation, and financial troubles led Shea to move the festival from November to April 2005, skipping 2004 entirely. The opening night "happening" was held at the Gershwin Hotel, while regular screenings were at Anthology Film Archives. Jim Morrison created silk-screened T-shirts for the festival, the first time MIX had shirts since 1996. MIX began a community screening program, which took work to various neighborhoods and communities, beginning with the Bronx in February 2005. Larry Shea left MIX after the 2005 festival to devote more time to his video art, and a new team was appointed in the fall, including Andre Hereford, Szu Burgess, Kate Huh and Stephen Kent Jusick. Moving MIX back to its traditional November timeslot was the first decision of the new staff. In May 2006, MIX began the Naked Eye Celebrity Camera benefit, auctioning off disposable cameras exposed by artists and celebrities including

Laurie Anderson Laurel Philips Anderson (born June 5, 1947), known as Laurie Anderson, is an American avant-garde artist, composer, musician, and film director whose work spans performance art, pop music, and multimedia projects. Initially trained in violin and ...

Gus Van Sant Gus Green Van Sant Jr. (born July 24, 1952) is an American film director, producer, photographer, and musician. He has earned acclaim as both an independent and mainstream filmmaker. His films typically deal with themes of marginalized subcultu ...

B.D. Wong Bradley Darryl Wong (born October 24, 1960) is an American actor. Wong won a Tony Award for his performance as Song Liling in ''M. Butterfly'', becoming the only actor in Broadway history to receive the Tony Award, Drama Desk Award, Outer Criti ...

Alec Soth Alec Soth (born 1969) is an American photographer, based in Minneapolis. Soth makes "large-scale American projects" featuring the midwestern United States. ''New York Times'' art critic Hilarie M. Sheets wrote that he has made a "photographic care ...

and over 100 others. The 2006 festival, the 19th, was held at the new 3LD Art & Technology Center in Lower Manhattan, and featured two screening rooms as well as window installations and an installations lounge. The 2007 festival began with a name change, to the New York Queer Experimental Film Festival, after a few years of requests from the public to a name more inclusive than "Lesbian and Gay" and embracing of contemporary terminology. The festival was held in an empty storefront in SoHo, and marked a shift away from traditional theater venues. Installations covered the space, and led back to the makeshift screening room. Additional installations were in the mezzanine, overlooking the whole space. Many shows were packed, including the '' Butt'' magazine show, and Homoccult and other Esoterotica, guest curated by Daniel McKernan and Richie Rennt. Another highlight was a screening of a rare 16mm print shot by Women's Liberation Cinema (

Kate Millett Katherine Murray Millett (September 14, 1934 – September 6, 2017) was an American feminist writer, educator, artist, and activist. She attended Oxford University and was the first American woman to be awarded a degree with first-class honors ...

and

Susan Kleckner Susan Kleckner was a feminist filmmaker, photographer, p erformance artist, and writer active from the late 1960s until 2010 and based in New York City. Early life Kleckner was born in New York City on July 5, 1941, as one of four children of ...

, among others) of the 1971 gay pride march in New York. For this screening Sharon Hayes performed a live audio accompaniment. Hayes continued working with this material, and the film and recorded audio were included in Hayes's show at the Whitney Museum in 2012. In 2008 MIX took over a former Liz Claiborne department store in the South Street Seaport, filling every nook and cranny with installations, decorations and performances. The festival took place in October, earlier than its traditional mid-November dates, because the space, donated free of charge by the landlord, was only available at that time. This year MIX NYC initiated a program of artist-designed T-shirts celebrating the festival, each available in a limited edition. The 2009 festival took place in Chelsea for the first time since 1993, this time in an {{convert, 7000, sqft, m2, adj=on empty storefront of a newly constructed condo building. Ceiling to floor glass windows gave MIX unprecedented street visibility, including projections by Lori Hiris and Kadet Kuhne. Installations were prominent again, most notably a large geodesic dome that was ''Wildflowers of Manitoba'', by Luis Jacob and Noam Gonick. A live actor inhabited the dome, silently lying there, listening to records, lighting incense and ruminating, while 3 projections illuminated some of the panels with scenes of a same-sex love and commitment. The closing night feature ''Maggots & Men,'' by Carey Cronenwett, was sold out, as were several other shows. The festival suffered some noise complaints from condo residents above, who felt that festival-goers were too loud. The 2010 festival was held at Theater for the New City, back in the East Village. Using three theater spaces in the TNC complex, MIX emphasized an immersive environment with a string art design in the venue by Diego Montoya. One smaller theater contained a performative installation by Daniel Pillis. Another theater was turned into an installation lounge, anchored by Blaise Garber-Paul's Queer Fruit Tree, which grew and changed throughout the week, and under which visitors could sit on astroturf, or on conical black cushions. The closing night film was Bruce LaBruce's L.A. Zombie, which sold out, and a second screening was added. In 2011 MIX took over a disused theater on Bleecker Street. The festival trailer, made on 16mm film by Gina Carducci, was projected on a continuous loop onto the building across the street, above the subway entrance. The venue design told a story of sorts. The lobby was dark with back-lit curtains that gave the impression of being in outer space. From there visitors could enter the screening room, or venture through lush psychedelic forest, and down steps to a subterranean space cave made of pink paper mache and pointy pink pillows. This downstairs space was a lounge, had a second stage used for performances, and contained most of the installations, including work by Adriana Varella, Szu Burgess, Coco Rico and others. The Occupy Wall Street movement was going on at the same time, and the NYPD raided Zuccotti Park just before the festival opened. As a result, MIX made the decision to open the venue as a sanctuary for queer Occupiers. The 25th MIX Festival took place in a two-story 20,000 sf former nut roasting factory in the Gowanus section of Brooklyn, the first time the festival had been held outside Manhattan. The first floor was a wide-open space that contained all of the many installations, as well as a small performance stage and many lounging areas. An interior design of spandex "explosions" filled the space, often running from ceiling to floor. The second floor, accessible only by a steep staircase, held the screening room, as well as 2 restrooms and administrative space. The closing night film was She Said Boom, about the Toronto band

Fifth Column A fifth column is any group of people who undermine a larger group or nation from within, usually in favor of an enemy group or another nation. According to Harris Mylonas and Scott Radnitz, "fifth columns" are “domestic actors who work to un ...

, with band member Caroline Azar in attendance. After the success of the festival in Brooklyn, the festival returned to Gowanus in 2013, taking over a 25,000 ft warehouse, which gave over about 15,000 sf to installation work, and 3600 sf screening room. The festival's visual theme was body parts, and a giant inflatable lung, which breathed slightly, greeted festival-goers as they entered. There were other inflatables, including Rachel Shannon's Breastival Vestibules, and other plastics that resembled veins. Jonathan Caouette returned to the festival with a new film that he finished hours before the screening at MIX NYC.

External links

NYU's Fales Library Guide to the MIX Collection

MIX NYC
Cultural festivals in the United States Film festivals established in 1987 LGBT events in New York (state) Experimental film festivals Queer organizations Film festivals in New York City LGBT film festivals in the United States

History

1980s

1990s

2000s

See also

External links