The council isn’t exactly throwing caution to the wind— and cash to Vim Crony— with reckless abandon, however. After submitting a lengthy application that required him to detail and account for all the various aspects of his project, the Cal Arts graduate had to undergo a group interview with Arts Council representatives and prove his commitment to the project.
“There were about five or six people there,” Vim Crony said. “I was trying to make eye contact with everybody [thinking], ‘Is the projector in the way? Did I miss eye contact with anybody?’ But great interview. I think it was probably one of my best interviews.”
According to the online application form for the grant, its purpose is to encourage “the development of experimental, risk-taking creative projects that advance an artist’s career and expose them to new audiences.”
Griselda Suarez, who became executive director of the Arts Council two months ago, explained that the organization created the grant to encourage artists and arts organizations in all disciplines to think beyond the usual parameters of their practice.
“We want to encourage the development of experimental, risk-taking creative projects that advance careers and expose artists to new audiences,” she said, adding that Vim Crony’s choice to use film to break down the dominant narrative of tragedy and pain that is often used by popular media to portray young people of color is an example of new, arts-based approaches that may help create breakthrough change for a complex issue.”
Arts Council President Marco Schindelmann said he’s excited to fund a project about a Long Beach subculture.
“I believe it is important to move beyond what many have perceived, correctly or incorrectly, to be past foci of Arts Council, namely mainstream aesthetic and practice along with what amounts to established institutional vendibles,” Schindelmann said. “In my opinion, innovation is slowly lapsing into becoming nothing more than a buzzword and a type of safe ideation threatened by formula and convenience. Risk as outcome opens the potential for the renovation of innovation.”
[aesop_image imgwidth=”500px” img=”http://www.signaltribunenewspaper.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Screen-Shot-2016-04-08-at-10.49.10-AM.png” align=”left” lightbox=”on” caption=”Byron Z. Enders and AJ Savage are a real-life couple who will be featured in Donovan Vim Crony’s short narrative film, Anarchy Nowadays, for which the filmmaker has received a Long Beach Arts Council Risk and Innovation grant.” captionposition=”left”] When asked how Vim Crony’s project fits into the spirit of the new grant, Schindelmann expounded on the concept of risk and its meaning within a modern context.
“In striving for artistic integrity and depth of spirit, and in order to topple the superficial expectations and affectations of both mainstream culture and hip outsider, the upstream imagination does not fear capsizing personal preconceptions and comfortable assumptions surrounding creative process,” Schindelmann said. “[Vim Crony’s] proposal revealed as much to the panel.”
In discussing the idea of risk, Vim Crony said he sees it as an integral element of filmmaking in general.
“I feel like all film projects are risky in and of themselves,” he said, explaining that some of his filmmaker friends have shot footage and then lost it, or they have completed a film that never really got exposure. “I feel like film is always risky, to me, and I kind of like that.”
Part of Vim Crony’s approach to risk-taking is the casting of non-actors to perform in his film, which he expects to have a running time of about 25 minutes. These individuals are young people he has met at local punk shows, and he has known some of them for years and watched them grow up.
Two of these locals are Byron Z. Enders and AJ Savage, a real-life couple who will be featured in the film. Vim Crony said he
wanted to feature a couple but not the type normally seen in Hollywood productions.
“I like subverting the typical images of couples in relationships— thin, pretty,” he said, adding that he sees Enders and Savage as “cute,” “incredible” and “beautiful” people.
[aesop_image imgwidth=”500px” img=”http://www.signaltribunenewspaper.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Screen-Shot-2016-04-08-at-10.49.02-AM.png” align=”left” lightbox=”on” caption=”Ryan Banks is a local non-actor who will be featured in Donovan Vim Crony’s short narrative film Anarchy Nowadays.” captionposition=”left”] As for the title, Anarchy Nowadays, Vim Crony is appropriating a word often associated with punk— “anarchy” — to characterize how young people of color can break out of societal and media expectations to pursue any career or creative path that appeals to them.
“It’s a current state of being, but it’s also having the ability to do whatever— having every option and avenue opened up to you, especially as a person of color,” he said. “I feel like— and this is one of the reasons I do film— we (people of color) are not seeing ourselves doing everything. We don’t constantly on a daily, weekly basis see ourselves as scientists or rockers. It’s very limited. So, I wanted there to be anarchy within that and just break out of that and make that a now thing.”
Although he describes Anarchy Nowadays as a “coming of age” film about young minorities, there will be no guns involved or police showing up to interrupt a punk show. His story is centered on less stereotypical aspects of young people’s lives.
When it comes to the P-word, Vim Crony acknowledges that various demographics of society use “punk” in vastly different ways.
“The black community has a very specific definition of the word ‘punk,’ and it’s got even more definition attached to it before that,” Vim Crony said. “But how I would describe a young rocker punk today is someone who’s willing to explore themselves and other platforms of living and creating courageously.”
Now that his project has gotten a substantial financial boost from the Arts Council, Vim Crony is eager to complete it and present a unique perspective on black, Latino and Asian youth.
“Young people of color around the world have been stuck in the same narratives of tragedy and pain through media and film for many years now,” he said. “Our collaborative effort to create something that shows we can grow, experience love, create art and learn from each within the context of a rock-and-roll film will be such a great experience.”
