Houston Cinema Arts Society Announces 2011 Film Festival Dates
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
SET TO HOST WORLD PREMIERE OF ART CAR: THE MOVIE
HOUSTON, TX – April 5, 2011 – Houston Cinema Arts Society (HCAS) has announced that the 2011 Cinema Arts Festival Houston will be presented November 9-13, 2011. Festival organizers have also announced that the 2011 Cinema Arts Festival Houston will host the world premiere of Art Car: The Movie (2011) on Sunday, November 13 at Miller Outdoor Theater in Hermann Park. HCAS and the Orange Show will present a special preview of Art Car: The Movie on Saturday, May 21 during the Art Car Parade Sneak Peek event on the Anheuser-Busch Stage in Discovery Green.
The 2011 Cinema Arts Festival Houston is the third annual festival presented by HCAS,and the only U.S. festival devoted to films by and about visual, performing, and literary artists. The 2010 festival drew thousands of film enthusiasts and art lovers spread among over 40 screenings and events. Over the past two years Cinema Arts Festival Houston has hosted A-list celebrities including Oscar-winners Tilda Swinton andShirley MacLaine, Isabella Rossellini, John Turturro, Richard Linklater, Guillermo Arriaga, Oscar-winning documentarian Alex Gibney, and “The King of Independent Animation” Bill Plympton.
With support from city leaders, enthusiastic patrons, and a highly developed network of arts organizations, the Cinema Arts Festival Houston is a civic project, conceived to highlight one the most vibrant and diverse arts communities on earth.
“The Art Car movement began as a highly original Houston art form and spread worldwide,” says HCAS Executive Director Trish Rigdon. “The film documents the quirky side of Houston’s remarkably diversified arts culture, and HCAS is proud to present ArtCar: The Movie as the finale of Cinema Arts Festival Houston 2011. It’s the perfect note for the closing night of our arts-oriented festival.”
A collaboration between native Houston filmmakers Carlton Ahrens and Ford Gunter,Art Car: The Movie follows a handful of local artists as they prepare their entries into the 2010 Art Car Parade along with an inside look at how the City of Houston and the Orange Show prepared for the event. The Houston Art Car Parade – the largest in the world – drew over 300,000 spectators in 2010 and included nearly 300 entries. The film also chronicles the automobile’s place in American culture and the rise of the Art Car Movement in Houston during the 1980′s. The free screening at Miller Outdoor Theater during the 2011 Cinema Arts Festival Houston is open to the public.
ABOUT THE HOUSTON CINEMA ARTS SOCIETY Houston Cinema Arts Society is a non-profit organization created in 2008 with the support of former Houston Mayor Bill White and the leadership of Franci Crane. HCAS organizes and hosts the annual Houston Cinema Arts Festival, a groundbreaking and innovative arts festival featuring films and new media by and about artists in the visual, performing and literary arts. The festival celebrates the vitality and diversity of the arts in Houston and enriches the city’s film and arts community. HCAS sponsors include the Crane Foundation, a grant from the City of Houston through the Houston Arts Alliance, Levantine Entertainment, Houston First Corporation, Anadarko Petroleum Corporation, Champion Energy Services, Amegy Bank of Texas, The Brown Foundation, Inc. and others. The project is also supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Texas Commission on the Arts. The 2013 Houston Cinema Arts Festival was held Nov. 6-10. For more information, please visit HCAS at www.cinemartsociety.org.