In co-operation with the ongoing Jue Festival, the Sub-Culture kids are hosting an all-day television mini-festival featuring short films, TV shows, cartoons, commercials, public service announcements, music videos, obscura, errata, apocrypha, and more. Basically, it’s a big, discursive TV show comprised of various interesting, funny and, or weird footage running all day long on Sunday from 3pm to 1am in the morning or so. Along with general clips and things wrested from ambiguous sources is a bunch of video relating to music makers living and working in Shanghai and China. A bunch of local bands have music videos in this thing, the (really quite great) DaBaoGe take-away shows are represented, and there’s a few documentary-type presentations on Shanghai music people doing tours and things.
So along with the random hodgepodge of television fodder, there’s some familiar faces in the mix. Huzzah for local arts and music.
Goes like this: they start at 3pm in the afternoon and they’ve got tea and biscuits for you, available for a modest price. Or Bloody Marys if you’re a hardcase. Get a seat, drop out, tune in. Free popcorn and give-aways throughout the day and some free pizza is turning up at some point. You can bring your own snacks and things (but not your own booze). No entry fee.
Here’s a little rundown of some of the more central, anchoring elements in the digital miasma:
3:30pm: We call it Skweee
In early 2008, the Italian filmmaker Iacopop Patierno discovered the quirky Scandinavian electro style Skweee and befriended some of its practitioners and, camera in hand, he followed some of the central Skwee artists for a year, starting in the functionalist Stockholm suburbs, traversing to Helsinki, and tripping down to Barcelona’s legendary Sonar festival, where eight Swedish and Finnish artists were invited to represent the scene.
5:00pm: Almaty By Bus
Almaty by Bus is a musical documentary following three members of Shanghai-based reggae group Uprooted Sunshine -- Arminda, Esia and Didjelirium -- as they make their way towards Almaty, Kazakhstan. 26 hours bus rides, live footage, local Kazakhstan music and interviews with those who are pushing reggae music in a place where nobody was expecting it.
6:00pm: Sin Cities: 'Shanghai'
Sin Cities: Shanghai is a documentary on Shanghai in the '20s and '30s -- gamblers, drug addicts, high-flyers, adventurers, and other colorful speculating reprobates. This is an in-depth look at that era, up until the political revolution and rumblings from Japan buzz killed the party.
7:00pm: The Antics Roadshow
Stories of people who have taken on the authorities and brought chaos to the streets -- "in a good way". Welcome to The Antics Roadshow, a celebration of public pranks, political stunts, and general disruption of the peace.
8:00pm: The External World
“An animated-analogue trip into the world of a boy learning to play piano. End of description…”
9:00pm: Graffiti Wars
Graffiti Wars depicts the battle of spray cans between freehand graffiti writer King Robbo and his nemesis, the stencil-using street artist Banksy. The graffiti war between the two men began in the early ‘90s but was re-ignited by what was widely seen as an unforgiveable transgression of strict graffiti rules by Banksy. It was an act that pulled 80s legend King Robbo out of retirement to retaliate in the place where it all began, the streets.
The film goes behind enemy lines as the war escalates, until tragic and unforeseen circumstances bring about an unexpected ceasefire.
10:00pm: Computer Chronicles: 'Midi'
Hosted by Stewart Cheifet, Computer Chronicles was a popular television program on personal technology during the height of the personal computer revolution in the '80s and '90s. In its prime, it was seen on more than 300 television stations in the United States and in over 100 countries worldwide.
This episode, from 1986, introduces the then-new Midi technology which has developed to become the central technological element of electronic music production and performance today.
10:50pm: Logorama
Logorama is an award-winning animated short film from the French H5 design collective, directed by François Alaux. The film takes the viewer on a violent, profane, action-packed caper set in a world comprised entirely of well-known corporate logos and iconic mascots, offering an original and entertaining critique of the consumerism of our times.
11:30pm: Canal+: 'Video Games'
Canal+, a pay-per-view French TV channel, ran a series of abstract documentaries during the early '90s, aired during prime time Saturday afternoons. Inviting various directors to cover a range of topics, most of the shows had very little in terms of commentary and were a straight montage of snippets, cuts and ideas based on the topic of choice. From that they’ve got the Video Game episode in all its glory.
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Sub-Culture TV is all day Sunday at Dada from 3pm. No entry fee. Free popcorn, tea, snacks, give-aways throughout the event.
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