OPENING WEEKEND PROGRAMS:

TOMORROWLAND: CalArts in Moving Pictures
The Museum of Modern Art, NYC
May 25 - August 13
39 Provocative Programs, Over 200 Filmmakers

The California Institute of the Arts was founded in 1961 by Walt Disney to bring the visual arts and performing arts together under one roof. Today, CalArts stands alongside Black Mountain College and the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design as one of the truly successful experiments in American arts education.

This exhibition celebrates more than three decades of intimate, inventive, and technically sophisticated student filmmaking and videomaking, and features a breathtaking range of nonfiction, narrative, animation, and experimental styles and genres. Particular focus is given to the famed animation program, where students have used everything from cutting-edge computer and optical printing technologies--many of which they developed themselves--to homespun materials like chewing-gum wrappers, nail polish remover, and lint. Luminaries from Pixar, Disney, Laika, Industrial Light and Magic and other major animation and effects companies are represented, including John Lasseter, Andrew Stanton, and Ralph Eggleson of Pixar; Eric Darnell, the director of Antz and Madagascar; Paul Demeyer, the director of Rugrats in Paris: The Movie; Stephen Hillenburg, the creator of SpongeBob SquarePants, Henry Selick, the director of Nightmare Before Christmas and the upcoming Coraline, Craig McCracken, the creator of The Powerpuff Girls; Mark Kausler, the director of many Simpsons episodes; and independent animation talents like Adam Beckett, Joyce Borenstein, Kathy Rose, and JJ Villard.

James Mangold (Walk the Line, Heavy), a star alumnus of the film directing program created by legendary British director Alexander Mackendrick (The Ladykillers, Sweet Smell of Success), is represented with two fiction shorts. Also included are two narrative films starring acting students Ed Harris and Paul Reubens.

Nonfiction and experimental works reveal a sense of political engagement and moral urgency, whether investigating domestic violence, toxic dumping, or the secret histories of seventeenth-century astronomers, Korean war brides, and African-American Kentucky Derby riders. Working in this vein are Edgar Arceneaux, Robert Fenz, Pieter Schoolwerth and Miguel Abreu, Deborah Stratman, Rubén Ortiz Torres, Naomi Uman, and Travis Wilkerson.

And special evenings will be devoted to artists who studied at CalArts under John Baldessari, Allan Kaprow, Pat O¹Neill, Wolfgang Stoerchle, and Michael Asher--artists like Ericka Beckman, Ken Feingold, Jack Goldstein, Sharon Greytak, Suzanne Lacy, Matt Mullican, Tony Oursler, David Salle, Christopher Williams, and David Wilson (the creator of The Museum of Jurassic Technology), whose conceptual films and Portapack videos of the 1970s and 1980s remain startlingly contemporary and provocative. Many of these artists will introduce and discuss their student work at MoMA as part of this CalArts tribute.

Organized by Joshua Siegel, Assistant Curator, Department of Film and Media, The Museum of Modern Art.

With gratitude to Steve Anker. Thanks also to Thom Andersen, John Baldessari, James Benning, Hartmut Bitomsky, Betzy Bromberg, Margaret Crane, Susan Davis, Myron Emery, Morgan Fisher, Leo Hobaica, Jr., Rachelle Katz, Cindy Keefer, Mike Kelley, Steven Lavine, Gary Mairs, Kris Malkiewicz, Patty Palmer, Paul Reubens, Bérénice Reynaud, Michael Scroggins, Alan Sekula, Maureen Selwood, Jeffrey Shapiro. Dedicated to the memory of Ed Emshwiller, Jules Engel, Alexander Mackendrick, and William Moritz.