2012 Whitney Biennial Opens Today!

Sculpture, painting, installations, and photography—as well as dance, theater, music, and film—will fill the galleries of the Whitney Museum of American Art in the latest edition of the Whitney Biennial. With a roster of artists at all points in their careers the Biennial provides a look at the current state of contemporary art in America. This is the seventy-sixth in the ongoing series of Biennials and Annuals presented by the Whitney since 1932, two years after the Museum was founded.

The 2012 Biennial takes over most of the Whitney from March 1 through May 27, with portions of the exhibition and some programs continuing through June 10. The participating artists were selected by Elisabeth Sussman, Curator/Sondra Gilman Curator of Photography at the Whitney, and Jay Sanders, a freelance curator and writer who has spent the past ten years working both in the gallery world and on independent curatorial projects. Sussman and Sanders co-curated the Biennial’s film program with Thomas Beard and Ed Halter, the co-founders of Light Industry, a venue for film and electronic art in Brooklyn.

The Whitney’s fourth-floor Emily Fisher Landau Galleries will become a dynamic 6,000-square-foot performance space for music, dance, theater, and other events. This is the first Whitney Biennial in which nearly a full floor of the Museum has been given over to a changing season of performances, events, and residencies.

Maria My Love picked up by Warner Brothers

MARIA MY LOVE has recently been picked up for digital distribution by Warner Brothers Digital Distibution/Gravitas Ventures and will be available on VOD beginning April 2012. The producers will also be releasing the film internationally soon. Exciting news for the film which took home best domestic feature film at the New York International Latino Film Festival (NYILFF) last year.

First Position - New Ballet Documentary at Toronto Film Fest

In her new documentary, First Position, director Bess Kargman shows us that ballet is not for sissies. It is fiercely competitive, physically demanding, and must be mastered early. First Position follows six young aspiring dancers (ages 9-19) as they prepare for the ballet world's toughest youth competition - the Youth America Grand Prix. With exclusive access to the competition, First Position offers an inside look at the extraordinary world of ballet and the determined young dancers who try to capture a dream only a few will achieve. Though the beauty of ballet is undenialable, in First Postion we get to see the drive and struggle that make ballet the pinnacle of dance.

The film is showing at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 11th and 17th.

Maria My Love wins at NYILFF

Launched in 1999, the New York International Latino Film Festival (NYILFF) is the premier Urban Latino film event in the USA, and this year Maria My Love took home the award for best domestic feature film. The award was accepted by producer Tiana Matthews. Inspired by a true story, Maria My Love is about a young woman named Ana (Judy Marte) struggling to deal with her mother's death and her father's mistakes. In an effort to feel better, she reconnects with her half-sister Grace, (Lauren Fales) and, inspired by a new boyfriend (Brian Rieger), sets out on a quest to find someone to help. Though excited and hopeful when she meets a hoarding woman named Maria (Karen Black), she encounters a situation more emotionally and morally complicated than she had expected to find. The film was written and directed by Jasmine McGlade Chazell.