Created in Birmingham

The splendid 7 Inch Cinema folk have announced the return of the Flatpack Festival which took a year off this year.  The dates for Flatpack 3 will be 11-15 March 2009.

The website for 2007′s festival is still up including this description of what it’s all about:

The festival remains fiendishly difficult to summarise, but intrepid punters can expect to find shorts, animation, music documentaries, independent features, live soundtracks, discussion events, web oddities, installations, parties and plenty more besides – with a general focus on people using limited resources in imaginative ways

Details are still a little way off with venues just being booked up now.  Stay tuned though.

This bit of info came from 7 Inch’s latest newsletter/listings for October which is well worth a look.

Oh heck, and I’ve just noticed it also mentions this:

Tuesday 11 November at Warwick Arts Centre
NOSFERATU
More Murnau, this time with the Matthew Eaton/Grandmaster Gareth score performed at Supersonic in July. (Sunrise next please!)

I saw half of this at Supersonic and can’t recommend it enough.  Nor can Cat Bray for that matter.

Lots of goodness at the next 7 Inch Cinema event:

• Launch of Pram‘s DVD ‘Shadow Shows of the Phantascope’
• Airings of some of Pram’s inspirations
• Brian Duffy and Grandmaster Gareth playing choons

and in a more tradtional 7 Inch vein earlier in the evening there’ll be plenty of shorts including:

• Rachael (Rill) Marchant – ‘Untitled Actress’
• Brothers McLeod – ‘Codswallop’ (their new short)

It’s on Sunday 28 Sept at the Hare & Hounds, starting at 7pm, and by my reckoning £4 is a bargain for all that.  Here’s the flyer:

and so the beginning of our benevolent colonial rule of Birmingham began

A passing mention on 7 Inch Cinema’s latest blog post (they’re just back from Tilda Swinton’s Ballerina Ballroom Cinema of Dreams) led me to this – an episode of Rex The Runt where Rex wins the city of Birmingham:

• Graphiquillan – tea break painting | process
  The joy of artists’ blogs – I like seeing the process behind/around the finished work. This is “the journey from sketch to almost finished study for a future painting”
• stitches and hos have a blog
  “For now here’s a picture of a knitted fish blanket that I love”.  A blog for the Birmingham chapter of the alt/nu/anti/un-knitting phenom. Ok, so ‘un-knitting’ doesn’t work as a descriptor.
• 7 Inch Cinema – Knitflicks
  More knitting-related action with photos from the weekend’s event in this gallery
• Supersonic 07 live recording – Oxbow Duo perform ‘Loves Holiday’
  After the success that was Supersonic 08, Capsule have released their first piece of vinyl on a limited run of 1000. I thought they were meant to be putting their feet up…

• Brumcast 106 ‘Asshole, Jackoff, Scumbag’
  Little Chris is back once again, like some sort of renegade master
• Inter-Act
  Shiny and new – “Inter-Act is a newly established devising company made up of young creative artists. Inter-Act are dedicated to creating new and exciting pieces of work whilst also providing educational programs for young people”
• The Big Picture – Help make the World Record mosaic at Thinktank
  From Monday 4 August until Thursday 21 August production of the individual panels that make up the mosaic will be taking place in Thinkspace, in Thinktank, Millennium Point. Volunteers are needed
• 7 Inch Cinema: Birthday Film
  From Scott from Film Ficciones – “I made this for UK film outfit 7 INCH CINEMA to be shown at their 5th birthday night, inspired by Kubrick. It’s all a bit of an inside-joke, so apologies to anyone stumbling across this completely unawares”
• Sutton Festival of Arts 08
  Photos from the weekend by Stuart Parker
• How to put people off contemporary art – The Eclectrician
  On the new Ikon Eastside exhibition – “The exhibit looks great, but oh, how my heart sank as I read the accompanying blurb”.

• Midlands sitting pretty at Edinburgh Film Festival – Birmingham Post
  Roger Shannon looks at Birmingham’s representation at the film festival
• Upon further investigation. A site visit to Ludgate Car Park in Birmingham (UK)
  Harry Palmer reports on his investigation/survey of one of the few remaining sites in Birmingham that hasn’t been built on since being bombed in WW2.
• 7inch July listings
  A fine round-up of the area’s goings-on from our recent interview stars

It’s a busy time for 7 Inch Cinema.  They’ve celebrated their 5th birthday, their excellent Flatpack Festival has gained recognition from the UK Film Counci and they have a series of events coming up as part of the Flux and Supersonic festivals.

Frankie sat down for tea and biscuits with Pip and Ian and discussed Ian’s Favourite Things and the upcoming Flummoxed (3 July) and Knitflicks (19 & 20 July) as well as their plans for the future.

7″ Cinema from Created in Birmingham on Vimeo.

First up, don’t forget that Ian from 7 Inch Cinema is presenting his Favourite Things at the Ikon Gallery this evening (25 June) from 6.30 to 7.30pm in the events room.

Consider that a taster for the main event on Saturday – 7 Inch Cinema’s birthday, which they’re celebrating with a line-up so tasty it’s almost obscene.  And only a fiver.

Here’s the flyer and, underneath, there’s a promo vid (aptly enough).  We’re hoping to have an interview with the organisers soon so stay tuned.

Some great news from the peeps at 7 Inch Cinema landed on the virtual doormat today.  The Flatpack Festival is the worthy recipient of funding for the next three years, securing it’s future and allowing the organisers to maybe think a little bigger.

Peter Buckingham from the UK Film Council (who are providing the funding) said of Flatpack:

Their innovative approach to screening films in churches, warehouses and shopping centres as well as cinemas and gallery spaces is a brilliant idea because it helps to attract new audiences to some great short films, animation and live film events

Flatpack 3 will take place in Feb 2009 and will launch “with a tribute to Birmingham’s pioneering film showman Waller Jeffs“.

DeafFest at Wolverhampton Light House have also received funding so well done to them too.

Last word goes to the understandably chuffed Flatpack producers:

without going all Oscar-night about it, it wouldn’t have been possible without all the filmmakers, volunteers, artists, promoters, technicians, funders, venues and enthusiastic punters who have chipped in to help us get this far. So thanks a lot, and here’s to Flatpack III in February 2009 and beyond…

Something that’s been in my ‘to investigate’ pile for a while, from 25 June to 13 July Vivid present FLUX-FEST, a season of events celebrating the spirit of Fluxus which, if you’ve not come across it before (like me), emerged as a reaction to the high-art of the 60′s. The emphasis is therefore on fun and frolics and will feature rare film, food, music, performance and miscellany.

So what’s happening?

• On 25 June there’s a dumpling party from 6pm to 8pm at Vivid
• Ensemble Interakt and a.a.s. present Re:Flux at St Paul’s Church on 27 June from 5pm to 9pm
• 7 Inch Cinema present Flummoxed at The Rainbow on 3 July

And there are all sorts of other things too. Check the Vivid website for more. Most of the events are either free or dirt cheap so it’s a ‘no excuse not to’ kinda situation.

A couple of good things from the Ikon. Firstly, every Wednesday over the summer the gallery and bookshop will be open until 8pm (cafe until 11pm).

Coinciding with the late openings is a series of talks called ‘These are a few of my favourite things’ which will be

loosely based on Desert Island Discs where speakers will present their eight most memorable artistic experiences illustrated by a slide show

The schedule for those is:

• 4 June – David Bintley, Director of Birmingham Royal Ballet
• 18 June – Sadie Plant, writer
• 25 June – Ian Francis, 7 Inch Cinema
• 9 July – Catherine O’Flynn, author

The talks start at 6.30pm and places are free, although they need to be booked in advance on 0121 248 0708.