0:00

and they’re friends of Alison a once

0:01

again here at our last showing of our

0:04

festival 2017 we’re very excited because

0:07

we’ve saved the best for last I believe

0:08

we have with us will you and Ella Willie

0:11

how are you today oh I’m doing great I

0:13

like being here this is so cool being in

0:15

the Sally here and you have all the big

0:17

buildings and and these lovely people

0:19

here you know taking my picture and all

0:23

that I think it’s great awesome having a

0:25

good time I’m glad to have you here you

0:27

know we’re just speaking a few minutes

0:29

ago about your travel wasn’t the

0:31

greatest but we’re glad you’re here now

0:32

we’re glad that you’ve arrived you

0:34

arrived in style let me tell you you’re

0:36

at in a black Jeep all you know very

0:39

very high-class with a nice little

0:40

glasses I like that I like that a lot

0:42

you know most people don’t know this but

0:44

I used to be in the CIA you know and

0:45

that those are always the kinds of SUVs

0:48

they drive you know there you have you

0:50

see we have someone who was in the CIA

0:52

used to be a now

0:54

filmmaker great with with the lens great

0:58

behind the camera great politics as well

1:01

in your visual styling and tonight we

1:04

have the privilege of actually having

1:05

one of your programs here tonight do you

1:07

want to speak a little bit about what

1:09

we’re going to be seeing and you know

1:10

just explain kind of like what what can

1:13

we can expect tonight

1:13

sure well you know first of all I got to

1:16

give a real big shout out to the loc net

1:19

people they were been very nice very

1:21

kind very sweet they provided me with

1:23

everything that I need and I think it’s

1:25

really been wonderful wonderful

1:27

treatment and the other thing that I

1:29

think is great is that you’re actually

1:30

closing this festival with an

1:33

experimental filmmaker film and video

1:35

maker usually it’s some commercial guy

1:37

with a big feature all that sort of

1:39

thing but this time you’re actually

1:40

having somebody from you know the RIA

1:44

the real community you know because

1:46

that’s the way I come up I’ve never had

1:48

any major sponsorship I’ve never you

1:51

know had a big film showing in the

1:53

Cineplex in incentive flexes or anything

1:55

I tried to basically make work that

1:57

comes from my life you know and tonight

2:00

we’re going to see the first part of the

2:02

program is going to be 5 super 8 films

2:05

that were blown up to 16 millimeter and

2:07

from what I understand they’re really

2:09

beautiful believe it or not I haven’t

2:11

even seen these prints there

2:12

pristine was the first time they’re ever

2:15

going to be projected so I’m really

2:16

excited about this because they really

2:18

represent my early work that I was doing

2:20

back in an apostle back in the in the

2:23

70s when I started making films I

2:25

started making film in 1971 so I’ve been

2:29

at it a long long time and I’ve shown

2:31

all over the United States and and even

2:33

in Europe and I’m you know I’ve had a

2:35

couple of big museum retrospectives I’m

2:38

just sort of giving a little bit of

2:39

background there but these films like in

2:42

progress March 1979 some of these other

2:48

films are really representative of my

2:50

early work and then the second half of

2:52

the program it’s going to be two video

2:54

pieces that I made between 2004 and 2006

2:59

one of them is called his hidden

3:01

presence and the other is a dual screen

3:03

piece called this burning world yeah

3:07

so that’s what I’m showing tonight and I

3:09

know it’s going to be very challenging

3:10

for the audience but you know all of you

3:12

look very smart and sophisticated to me

3:14

obviously you can you’ll enjoy these

3:17

films I think absolutely one of the

3:19

things I really enjoyed seeing is that

3:21

you work with eight super 8 and 16 and

3:25

in this particular project you decided

3:28

to go from super 8 and blow it up to 16

3:30

can you tell us you know through our

3:33

audience out there what the main

3:35

difference is between super 8 going to

3:37

16 and why you’ve made that decision to

3:39

to blow up well what happened was was I

3:42

was approached by Anthology Film

3:43

Archives in New York and there are very

3:46

prestigious outlet for avant-garde

3:48

experimental film and video and they

3:51

approached me about preserving some of

3:53

my early work so they took the films

3:55

they made inter-

3:56

put them in a vault and then they also

3:59

made 16 millimeter blow ups and they

4:01

gave me my own collection of those films

4:03

so that was a real honor and I didn’t I

4:05

didn’t pay a penny for them you know and

4:06

I was very surprised because they sought

4:08

me out you know and and it was a

4:11

wonderful experience they did a

4:12

beautiful job

4:13

and now those films no matter what

4:16

happens to me if I drop dead tomorrow

4:17

which better not happen ah at least that

4:21

work will be there awesome wow that’s

4:24

that’s actually really good kind of like

4:25

retrospective

4:26

like you know your what your roots your

4:29

humble beginnings to where you are today

4:30

and I think that speaks to it on its own

4:33

you know someone that really came from

4:35

you know literally just 1971 you said

4:37

was the first time you made a film can

4:39

you tell us you know what you’ve learned

4:41

from maybe one thing you’ve taken away

4:43

from you know the we landed up from 1971

4:46

to the winter that’s with us today like

4:48

what is it that you could tell yourself

4:49

now or what is it something like are

4:51

memorable yeah I would say that the

4:54

thing that that one of the things that I

4:55

think is really important to me these

4:57

days is how important it is for artists

4:59

to be politically aware I realized that

5:03

a lot of artists I know in the past and

5:05

even I was a little bit that way for a

5:07

while that you know they think of

5:09

themselves as being apolitical that

5:11

their work doesn’t have to fit in with

5:13

with the world it doesn’t have to be a

5:15

response to the world what’s happening

5:17

to them or to their community to their

5:20

race you know etc but I have just become

5:23

I mean I was always very political but

5:25

now I have to say it and it’s a truth

5:27

being an American ever since the

5:29

election of Donald Trump it has been

5:32

really just absolutely full-bore very

5:36

much on a heavy alert for this guy you

5:39

know and having to be very much aware of

5:41

what he’s doing and how he’s affecting

5:43

our communities and that means the

5:45

Chicano community the Latino community

5:47

the black community gays of poor people

5:52

etc that you know in population experts

5:57

predicted by the year 2050 minorities

6:00

are going to be the majority and just

6:03

think about that it’s only 30 years away

6:06

I mean I probably won’t get to see it

6:08

but you guys will all of you wonderful

6:10

young people are going to see that and

6:12

it’s going to be up to you to seize the

6:14

leadership you know wow that’s really

6:17

great and just to kind of finish off

6:18

wrap up really quickly you know we have

6:21

an amazing program tonight and we’re

6:22

very excited but if you could sum up

6:25

your program tonight enough in a single

6:27

phrase or word you know just to sum up

6:30

everything what would what would you

6:32

what word would you use or what phrase

6:33

we use to do that well I thought I a lot

6:37

of people have asked me these kinds of

6:38

questions and

6:40

I think a lot of it has to do with our

6:42

self-identity you know who we think we

6:45

are who we are trying to be and and who

6:49

others think we are do you know what I’m

6:52

saying and a lot of that has to do with

6:53

identity self identity and I think that

6:56

tonight you’re going to see somebody who

6:59

maybe you know I’m a Chicano I’m from El

7:02

Paso you know my given name is Guillermo

7:05

I go by Willie because you know I went

7:08

to school on the 50s and all my teachers

7:11

were Anglo up until like the sixth grade

7:13

and they couldn’t pronounce the animal I

7:16

just finally got so fed up that they

7:18

were saying things like oh cool ii-era

7:20

mo and the cool air mo I thought that’s

7:22

ridiculous you know and I just said you

7:25

know what just call me Willie like

7:26

Willie Mays you know or something and so

7:29

I I think that my identity and I think

7:32

the identity of a lot of Chicanos is

7:34

wrapped up in this the problem of

7:37

simulations you know and finally when we

7:40

become fully realized we have to admit

7:45

we are really citizens of the world

7:47

we’re not just restricted to our to our

7:50

neighborhood to the city even the

7:53

country because there is so much that is

7:56

coming in to us all the time if you can

7:58

read and write and speak you are citizen

8:01

of the world you have to be that’s what

8:03

I think awesome thank you so much really

8:05

friends Valentina we’ll see you next

8:07

time and thank you so much enjoy the

8:09

program

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