FilmGate Fest Brings the Best of Global Immersive Storytelling to Miami

Attendees at FilmGate 2023 enjoy the dome experience at the Frost Museum of Science. This year’s FilmGate Interactive Festival opens once again at the Frost. (Photo courtesy of FilmGate Miami)

A planetarium experience that reimagines the 1982 film “Koyaanisqatsi,” a work by an artificial intelligence architect and comedian that’s a nod to soul and hip hop musicians, and another that explores the destructive nature of desire. And that’s just the opening night offerings of  FilmGate Interactive Festival XI.

The festival has established itself as a cornerstone of South Florida’s film ecosystem, empowering filmmakers and media artists while helping to elevate the region’s reputation as a dynamic filmmaking destination.

This year’s festival, during Miami Art Week, begins Wednesday, Dec. 4 through Sunday, Dec. 8 with programming that includes screenings, creative labs, installations,  speakers, and live events.

 Opening night at the Frost Science Museum in downtown Miami, sonically and visually stunning experiences will play off the expansive planetarium dome: “The Vivid Unknown,” by John Fitzgerald, “BBL Drizzy, The Musical,” by AI architect and comedian, King Willonious, and “Earths to Come,” by Rose Bond.

The event will also feature a live musical performance by the Colombian duo, 89 Birds, in collaboration with VJ Felipe Aguilar, who has designed the visuals specifically for the dome. Their work pays tribute to the biodiversity of Colombia.

Diliana Alexander, co-founder, executive director of FilmGate Miami (Photo courtesy of Filmgate Miami)

Diliana Alexander, FilmGate founder and festival curator, says she has spent the last twelve months attending global festivals in order to bring a subsection of multifarious, immersive projects to Miami.   “One of the main questions we ask ourselves during programming is, who are the people, and what is the technology that’s creating the most interesting storytelling experiences,” says Alexander.

This year, the FGI IX’s selected projects will participate in the first ever North American Immersive Market that matches each invited creator with potential funders, partners, and distributors. The projects hail from France, Canada, Germany, Brazil, Colombia, the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Netherlands, and address everything from sex work and intimacy to well-being and the reconnection to nature.

The projects include a 15-minute, virtual reality (VR) installation, “Duchampiana,” from France and Germany, in which creator Lillian Hess reinterprets Marcel Duchamp’s famous painting “Nude Descending A Staircase No. 2” and challenges viewers to engage with the social constructs around gender roles.

French creator, Ugo Arsac presents, “Girlfriend Experience,” an interactive video documentary that looks at the actual Girlfriend Experience sex service, in which sex workers offer tenderness and intimacy along with physical pleasure.

“Habub,” by Colombian creator Carmen Gil Vrolijk consists of immersive polyphonies that explore the large clouds of Saharan sand that travel and eventually mix with the soil of the Amazon.

“Soul Paint,” by Sarah Ticho and Niki Smit, representing the UK and Netherlands, respectively, uses body mapping, 3D drawing, and movement to express human emotions.  Narrated by actress Rosario Dawson, participants are invited to reveal their inner reality and then observe the creations of others to encourage new forms of embodied knowledge.

The festival will also host the first indigenous delegation, connecting First Nations people from Canada with the Miccosukee Community of South Florida.

Additionally, there are over 15 exhibition projects that will participate in their own competition. Included in the exhibition are “Mammary Mountain,” by Camille Baker, Tara Baoth Mooney, and Maf’j Alvarez that addresses breast cancer, and “Ancestors,” an interactive segment that creates an AI generated offspring from participant selfies that results in the creation of a family tree.

A visitor takes part in the virtual reality programming at FilmGate 2023. (Photo courtesy of FilmGate Miami)

The FGI IX speaker list is a “who’s who” of digital leaders.  Among these are Alain C. Brusch, global head of Digital Platforms at Art Basel; Savannah Niles, designer, and technologist working in XR at Meta; Bianca Shonee Arroyo-Kreimes, a Costa Rican-Canadian digital media artist; Corbin Graves, the manager of Interpretive Media and Gallery Programing at the Pérez Museum of Art; David Sinopoli is producer of III Points Festival, and Nonny de la Peña is a journalist and VR pioneer.

There will be a competition for Best Market, Best of Tech, and Best of Fest, guided by a panel of eight jurors including Liz Rosenthal, who is the curator of the Biennale’s Venice International Film Festival’s Immersive Content Official Selection and Competition; Lindsay Grace  Knight Chair in Interactive Media and Graduate Program Director of the MFA in Interactive Media at the University of Miami; Jeanne Marchalot, Director of France TV Story Lab, and others.

Winners will be announced on the closing night sunset yacht cruise.

Alexander and the FilmGate Miami team have programmed the festival with the goal of getting attendees out and about in Miami. In addition to events at the Frost Museum of Science, the Paramount Miami World Center, and the boat cruise, there is an event at the Bass Museum, as well as planned excursions to immersive art experience Superblue in Allapattah, Scope and Nada Art Fairs.  Creators and industry professionals will be on hand to mix and mingle during a series of cocktail hours and breaks designed for networking and knowledge sharing.

WHAT: FilmGate Interactive Media Festival 

WHERE: Phillip and Patricia Frost Museum of Science, 1101 Biscayne Blvd., Miami; Paramount Miami World Center, 851 NE 1st. Ave., Miami; Bass Museum of Art, 2100 Collins Ave., Miami Beach.

 WHEN: 6:30 p.m., Wednesday, Dec. 4, Frost Museum opening night; 6 to 9 p.m., Sunset cruise and award ceremony, Bayside Marina, 401 Biscayne Blvd., Sunday, Dec. 8, various times for other events. Download the complete schedule here.

 COST: $60, opening night; $30, day pass; $220-$305, VIP Pass, $150 sunset cruise and award ceremony. Purchase tickets at www.filmgate.miami/event-details

 INFORMATION:  (305) 916-6973 and  filmgate.miami/fgix

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