Visibility Equals Power

Visibility equals power. Period. You cannot find solutions using the same consciousness that created the problem.  Can the unseen filmmaker claim to exist in a world where Main Street starves and Wall Street eats?  Not at all.  You cannot change a dream from inside, you must step outside of the dream to change it. The question becomes how do multicultural image-makers increase their media visibility in order to connect directly with communities who care most.  My work with Project Catalyst continues to tackle this pressing issue. We’re pioneering a digital settlement in the wild west of the web, offering an uncompromising signature destination for art passionate, tech savvy, socially aware, multicultural millennials who yearn for a mediascape where creators and connoisseurs can connect, voice, see, and hear fresh perspectives reflecting our diverse society.  

Artel Great, Project Catalyst, Technology and the Future of Multicultural Entertainment

Recently, I was invited to participate in Urbanworld Digital, a New Media program held at the HBO Theater in New York City.  The one-day event served as a digital media conference that focused on addressing the impact of technology on the creation and marketing of new media content. Executives ranging from HBO to YouTube and various film and media professionals shared their expertise as a primer for the 18th Annual Urbanworld Film Festival. 

My presentation highlighted the role of Project Catalyst in ushering in a brighter future for multicultural entertainment. Our disruptive model thrives outside of the dominant system. Through our advancements in new technology and strategic focus on audience building we find ourselves at a moment impregnated with empowering possibilities.

By focusing on real-world issues, we’ve found real-world answers with the Project Catalyst Multicultural Movie & Music App. We’ve heard from a global audience on 6 different continents now spanning 32 countries and counting. Take a look at the map below to see where the app's growth is most rapid. Project Catalyst App users around the world have demonstrated their interest in liberating the multicultural image from the shadows of dominant media culture.  We are currently working to uncover even more solutions. My commitment is to bringing communities progressive content curated to empower, illuminate, and inspire.  Together we can open new windows of opportunity for content creators to expand the reach of their work and for diverse audiences to stay on the cutting edge of indie film, music, and art.  Together we can increase our media visibility--- not only for this generation, but for the sake of a better multicultural future. 

The 32 countries that are currently watching content on the Project Catalyst  Multicultural Movie & Music App

So if you’re only watching broadcast, cable TV, or Hollywood film, you’re missing out on really amazing artistic works. Take control of your image and download the Project Catalyst App. You’ll see a better world. 

CRI Fellow Artel Great Talks Project Catalyst & the Dilemma of Multicultural Media Distribution

2014 CRI Fellow Artel Great is a thought leader on media visibility and an advocate for the improved representation of both multicultural content creators and audiences. As a PhD candidate in Cinema Studies at NYU, a filmmaker with degrees from UCLA, and a CRI Fellow, Artel has been tirelessly instigating positive change on both sides of the camera.

During his CRI Fellowship, he has dedicated himself to Project Catalyst - an app that delivers content produced by multicultural filmmakers to multicultural audiences. Through Project Catalyst , Artel is working to give voice to often-marginalized artists and to satisfy a largely underserved audience's demand for better, more resonant entertainment . In this interview, writer/director/producer Kiara C. Jones talks with Artel about Project Catalyst - from the philosophy behind its development to how to download the app for free. 

Artel claims that "visibility is power" and we wholeheartedly agree. If you do, too, share the interview and download the app! 

Do Movies Really Matter?

Movies make magic.  They captivate us.  They transform us.  They take the mundane and modify it before our waking eyes.  In fact, cinema assumes a pedagogical role in the lives of many people.  At its best, film travels through the hidden chambers of our minds and alters what already exists; clearly, movies could not achieve this spectacular feat by merely reflecting the norm. [1]

Motion pictures, at their core, expand possibilities.  In other words, cinema represents a very powerful vision of what our future can hold.  That said, my work with the Cinema Research Institute is aimed at impacting the heart of cinema’s most vital role in our society and that, in my opinion, is to increase our vision of⎯ the possible!

New media technology boom

Today, new technology continues to push the boundaries of human connectivity.  And as media culture rapidly changes with these new technologies (digital, mobile, internet, social media, etc); quite frankly, cinema and television still remain highly active sites for the production and circulation of complex power relations.

In his book, Devil Finds Work,  James Baldwin explores certain underlying assumptions found in American media.  He reminds us of the fundamental necessity for storytelling as a critical component of the human experience.  That is, after all, why humans invented poetry, art, music, literature, film, etc.  Baldwin contends that, “in order for a person to bear his [or her] life, he [or she] needs a valid re-creation of that life.” [2]  Wow. Rather profound, huh?!  (Gotta LOVE James Baldwin.)

James Baldwin, novelist, essayist, playwright, cultural theorist

To that extent, the epistemological function of cinema and television in the process of global socialization and human identity formation cannot be easily overlooked.  Cinema (and media in general) provides us with the stories and images of our humanity that help shape our understanding of being-in-the-world. [3]

The question then begs to be asked⎯ what is the psychic and empirical toll on the lives of those marginalized groups whose images, stories, and experiences have become invisible or grossly distorted in the commercial film and television landscape?

With this in mind, I am immensely honored and excited that throughout the 2014-2015 year I have been chosen to work with the Cinema Research Institute (CRI) to tackle tough questions like this.  My research is aimed at excavating innovative film distribution strategies to address issues of media diversity for underserved communities, including but not limited, to Black, Latino, Asian-American, and Native-American audiences and filmmakers.

I’d like to thank the CRI for bestowing me with this prestigious fellowship.  I deeply appreciate your confidence and tremendous support, particularly, the incomparable Dean Mary Schmidt Campbell, the assiduous John Tintori, the percipient Robert Warren, the enterprising Richard Vague, and the astute Colin Brown.  You have selected me to receive this award for a reason, and I will not disappoint.    I desire to thank my vivacious, beautiful, and intelligent mother, Ms. G.B. Walker.  There are no words to adequately express how much you mean to me.   I am⎯ because you are.  Last, but most certainly not least, I desire to thank my most wise, pioneering, and courageous ancestors upon whose shoulders I stand.  Thank you for blazing a trail that I might follow.  I hope to one day extend your legacies and inspire others the way you have inspired me.   Also, special thanks to the tireless Miranda Sherman.  And congratulations to my fellow Fellows (pun intended) ⎯ stay thirsty, my friends.

To the vibrant multicultural audiences,  the under-recognized, progressive, humanistic filmmakers with diverse voices, and to the broader audiences who have multicultural tastes⎯ I see you!!!  I know you’re out there and together we will make a positive impact and our voices will be heard!!!

I definitely real(eyes) that great ideas can change the world, but it requires great people to make it happen.  That’s why I’ll need your help throughout the year, to engage the film and entertainment community in a long-running dialogue, while designing positive solutions toward media equity, as we work diligently to disrupt the status quo in dominant film distribution.  I thank you in advance for your support.   And I look forward to taking this amazing journey with you all !!!

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Notes:

1. Jeanette Winterson. Art Objects: Essays on Ecstasy and Effrontery (Random House, 1997).

2.  James Baldwin. The Devil Finds Work (Random House, 1976).

3. See Martin Heidegger, Being and Time (HarperCollins, 2008), 84.