Properties Vol 3 2017 Lights, Camera Houston

LIGHTS, CAMERA,

For nine years, Houston Cinema Arts Festival has spotlighted talented filmmakers, acclaimed artists, and the toughest act to follow– the Bayou City.

by Jeanne Lyons Davis ities as near as Austin and far as Cannes have garnered international acclaim for their respective film festivals. And now, after nearly a decade of percolating unique and dynamic programming, the world is looking at the Houston Cinema Arts Festival.

But HCAF, a byproduct of Houston Cinema Arts Society, was not built in a day. It took a village, the foresight of Houston visionaries, and—like the films they hoped to wrangle—a bit of movie magic.

In 2007, Mayor Bill White wanted to attract the film industry to Houston and he knew just the person for the job.

“I’ve known Bill for too long,” laughs Franci Neely, a retired litigator, active philanthropist and proud cinephile. When she visited the newly elected mayor—and her former University of Texas School of Law classmate—during his first term in office, he had a task for Neely.

“Bill knew that the performing arts, including cinema, were passions of mine, and he appointed me to lead a task force to figure out how to attract the film industry to Houston,” says Neely.

Neely shares that White understood the importance of filmmaking to a city’s economy, especially after seeing the success of neighboring states.

For example, Louisiana introduced tax incentives in 2002 to attract the industry to what is now nicknamed “Hollywood South.” By 2011, Louisiana hosted more than 150 productions (think The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Pitch Perfect) with $1.3 billion spent in the state.

With success stories so close to home, Neely and White thought: “How can we do that in Houston?” The task force, and subsequently, the Houston Cinema Arts Society and Festival, were born.

While initiating competitive tax incentives in the Lone Star State would be a challenge, the task force focused on cultivating a world-renowned festival to showcase Houston’s top secret weapon: the arts. This vital initiative of showcasing the Bayou City’s robust, world-class art institutions remains a fundamental pillar of the festival today. As the fourth largest city in the country, and arguably the most diverse in the nation, Houston boasts some of the world’s—yes, world’s!—most distinctive and active arts organizations and patrons.

From monumental exhibits at the Museum

2013 Thomas Haden Church, HCAS Chair Franci Neely_Credit Daniel Ortiz

of Fine Arts to innovative programming at Project Row Houses, the Bayou City is home to more than 150 distinctive cultural institutions. For the Houston Cinema Arts Society, that’s something worth shouting from the rooftops.

“The remarkable art institutions in Houston don’t get the international attention they deserve. Our arts culture rivals that of Los Angeles, New York and Chicago, and it certainly is the best in Texas,” shares Neely. “We need something that’s equal to, if not better than, SXSW in Austin. For goodness sake—we’re the fourth largest metro area in the country and the top city in terms of international diversity. It’s Houston’s turn.”

Neely’s task force enlisted the support of Patrick Kwiatkowski in 2007. While he has a chemical engineering background, Kwiatkowski, who was a HCAS board member and named Executive Director in January 2017, has always had one foot in the arts world.

“I’ve always been involved with films, from shorts to experimental.

It’s a true passion of mine,” shares Kwiatkowski, who started the Independent Exposure screening program in Seattle in 1996 before moving to Houston in 2000, where he co-founded Microcinema International, a leading distributor of arts-related films.

The self-proclaimed film buff shared that because of the hundreds of festivals across the world, Houston needed to find a focus to attract people to its world-class programming. Once again, the answer pointed toward Houston’s active and vital arts presence.

In 2008, acclaimed film festival programmer Richard Herskowitz interviewed with the task force. “After that visit, I remember walking into the Menil Collection and thinking it was one of the greatest museums that I had never heard of. My wife and I live in the art world, and I felt embarrassed about how little I was aware of the city’s art culture,” says Herskowitz, current HCAS Artistic Director and festival curator. “It then became my mission to lift that veil away from Houston.”

Director Trish Rigdon, HCAF Artistic Director Richard Herskowitz_Credit Daniel Ortiz

Herskowitz and the festival have continued to spotlight the city ever since. In 2008, they initiated a small pilot festival, which featured a mix of artists, including acclaimed international media artist Lynn Hershman and Latino filmmaker, Alex Rivera. “It became clear that it’s not just a film festival,” shares Herskowitz.

“It’s a cinema arts festival—an intersection of film with other art forms, about and by artists.”

Director Trish Rigdon, HCAF Artistic Director Richard Herskowitz_Credit Daniel Ortiz

2015_Amy Berg

2015_Andrew Henderson and Asli Omar

2014_James Ivory and Julie Taymor

The pilot event was a hit. Following the official, full-length festival in 2009, featuring Houston-born filmmaker and honorary HCAS board member Richard Linklater (Dazed and Confused, Boyhood) and Academy Award-winning actress Tilda Swinton (I Am Love, Moonrise Kingdom), every year has gotten bigger and better.

2015_Bun B

While HCAF continues to cultivate relationships and develop partnerships with new organizations and storied institutions, such as the Houston Museum for African American Culture last year, no program has done more to put the festival on the international map than CineSpace, a short film collaboration with NASA that was initiated in 2015.

When the Houston-based aeronautics agency wanted to promote its public archives —everything from the moon landing to launching the international space station—the Johnson Space Center approached HCAF about a possible collaboration. Kwiatkowski helped envision CineSpace as a competition where artists from around the world would incorporate archival footage into short films. In its third year, the franchise is already a monumental success.

“It’s a program that has broad international appeal and, most importantly, is unique to Houston, the home of NASA,” shares Neely. “No other city can do this like we can.”

2016_Celine Lee, Dale Watson_Credit Anna Veselov

2014_Joanne King Herring

New to this year and future festivals is HCAF expansion into other art forms.

Herskowitz is particularly looking forward to seeing a crossover of film and music.

A few years ago, Houston-based rapper Bun B joined the HCAS board, adding his indispensable talents and enthusiasm to the organization. “Bun B has a really strong presence in our festival. He’s a well connected figure in the hip-hop world but is also a huge cinephile,” shared Herskowitz. Just last year, he interviewed legendary cinematographer Frederick Elmes, who screened his acclaimed film, Blue Velvet, which celebrated its 30th anniversary at the festival.

“We want to make Houston an important stop on the festival tour by introducing new concepts like brewery series, capstone events, and the incorporation of concerts into the mix to get more young people

involved; a new collaboration with White Oak Music Hall is on the horizon for the 2017 programming lineup,” says Kwiatkowski.

As the festival nears its landmark 10th anniversary, Neely notes that the secret sauce to HCAF’s successful past and bright future isn’t just Houston’s profound art institutions and inventive programming—it is also Houstonians themselves.

“We need to continue to shout how great our city is, and the Houston Cinema Arts Festival is one of the primary ways to do that. It brings more attention and more people to the city, and success continues to breed additional success,” says Neely. “But it starts with Houstonians—we need the community to be the megaphone for our city.”