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Art Film Talk #20 Christen McArdle, Ann Arbor Film Festival
September 23rd, 2007
Christen McArdle is the Executive Director of the Ann Arbor Film Festival, the oldest festival of its kind in North America showcasing avant-garde, documentary and independent films from around the world. We talk about the festival's fundraising campaign and the censorship controversy the festival has been involved with. The 46th Ann Arbor Film Festival will take place on March 25th through the 30th, 2008, and they are currently accepting submissions, the standard deadline is coming up soon on October 1st, and their late deadline is November 15th. Introduction and closing music was composed by Colin Owens.
December 5th, 2007 at 7:28 pm
Today the Ann Arbor Film Festival announced an important victory for artist rights and protection of the First Amendment with a successful settlement in their federal lawsuit against the State of Michigan. Unconstitutional state arts funding restrictions, which they challenged with their lawsuit, are being repealed and replaced with guidelines mirroring those of the National Endowment for the Arts, which have been upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Christen McArdle, AAFF Executive Director, said: "This decision isn't only a victory for artistic freedom of expression, but a reminder to stand up and ensure that our government is held accountable for the power they wield,” and “We are pleased that arbitrary guidelines will no longer be used to deny artists their creative rights.”
We are so pleased with the results.