PEW Fellowships in the Arts has recently re-worked their website, along with their selection processes. So, they’ve removed from the new site all the wonderful glennfilms produced and Ann Tegnell edited portraits of the 2007 & 2008 Fellows. Well, they ARE up in cyberspace on the PEW Fellowships in the Arts YouTube channel. Go! Check ‘em out. Have some fun and hope that you, too, may some day be so rewarded.

2010 UPDATE!ed website is here. Go to the 2008 + 2007 portraits to see Ann’s work.

glennfilms has let us know that spark., the little video that could, was a recently featured artsJournalvideo. Arts Journal is a daily arts news site that collects, writes about and offers discussion on a full range of arts subjects. A site to bookmark, for sure. spark. may only be up on their site for a few weeks, but connects to a good-quality YouTube version posted by the Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance.

Now would also be the time to note the passing of Peggy Amsterdam, long-time champion of the arts in Philadelphia and beyond. She was a participant in spark. and glennfilms put together a bit more of her appearance for a memorial to her on December 30th.

Kino-Eye ‘Notables of the Noughties’ list includes Mirror Dance as one of the best documentaries of the past decade. As María says, “Nice to be recognized!” Check out the company we are in…

• Mirror Dance (Frances McElroy and Maria T. Rodriguez, 2005)
• The Gleaners and I (Agnès Varda, 2000, French title: Les glaneurs et la glaneuse)
• Dogtown and Z-Boys (Stacy Peralta, 2001)
• In the Mirror of Maya Deren (Martina Kudlácek, 2002)
• A Kalahari Family (John Marshall, 2002)
• Spellbound (Jeffrey Blitz, 2002)
• The Kid Stays in the Picture (Nanette Burstein and Brett Morgen, 2002)
• Winged Migration (Jacques Perrin, 2002, French title: Le peuple migrateur)
• The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara (Errol Morris, 2003)
• My Architect (Nathaniel Kahn and Susan R. Behr, 2003)
• Tarnation (Jonathan Caouette, 2003)
• The Corporation (Mark Achbar and Jennifer Abbott, 2003)
• The Weather Underground (Sam Green and Bill Siegel, 2003)
• Super Size Me (Morgan Spurlock, 2004)
• Darwin’s Nightmare (Hubert Sauper, 2004)
• March of the Penguins (Luc Jacquet, 2005, French title: La marche de l’empereur)
• Grizzly Man (Wener Herzog, 2005)
• Al otro lado (Natalia Almada, 2005)
• The Cats of Mirikitani (Linda Hattendorf, 2006)
• Favela Rising (Jeff Zimbalist and Matt Mochary, 2005)
• Havana — The New Art of Making Ruins (Florian Borchmeyer and Matthias Hentschler, 2006, German title: Havana – Die Neue Kunst Ruinen Zu Bauen)
• An Inconvenient Truth (Davis Guggenheim, 2006)
• Flying: Confessions of a Free Woman (Jennifer Fox, 2006)
• When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts (Spike Lee, 2006)
• Shadow of the House (Allie Humenuk, 2007)
• Helvetica (Gary Hustwit, 2007)
• Iraq in Fragments (James Longley, 2007)
• Made in L.A. (Almudena Carracedo, 2007)
• Waltz with Bashir (Ari Folman, 2008)
• Man on Wire (James Marsh, 2008)
• The Garden (Scott Hamilton Kennedy, 2008)
• Intimidad (David Redmon and Ashley Sabin, 2008)
• King Korn (Aaron Woolf, Curt Ellis and Ian Cheney, 2009)
• Herskovits at the Heart of Blackness (Llewellyn Smith, 2009)
• Shooting Beauty (Courtney Bent and George Kachadorian, 2009)

The Kino-Eye blog is the work of David Tamés. Thanks, David!

If you’d like a refresher on our doc, here it is

MIRROR DANCE

Documentary | 2005 | 60 mins | view clip

Producers-Directors
Frances McElroy and Maria Rodríguez

Editor
Ann Tegnell

MIRROR DANCE tells the story of Cuban-born identical twins Ramona and Margarita de Saá, whose once inseparable relationship is severed by international politics when one moves to the United States and the other remains behind. Though separated for almost 40 years, both continue to share a passion for dance. Shot in the United States and Cuba over a period of four years, the film reveals some of the complexities of the sisters’ relationship: the worlds in which they live, the choices each has made and the conflicts each has endured. Set within the context of the turbulent dynamic between the two countries, MIRROR DANCE focuses on the twins’ story of division, difference and ongoing efforts at reconciliation. It is a universal story that speaks to the personal pain, loss and waste that can result from international hostilities.

It’s shaping up to be a good, busy year for the extendedPLAYers. Stay tuned!