EPFC Summer Artist In Residence Program
This four-week residency is an opportunity for an emerging or established filmmaker to explore our urban Los Angeles neighborhood, utilize EPFC’s equipment and services to facilitate a short film project, and share creative vision, experience and knowledge with the Echo Park community.

In addition to the artist completing and exhibiting at least one new work, the terms of the residency include teaching one workshop to local youth (12 hours) on any topic related to media art, and curating one evening screening of films / videos which may be a retrospective of past work or a program of work by other filmmakers whose works reflect ideas of interest and influence to the artist in residence.

The residency, scheduled for the month of August, includes lodging in a nearby apartment and an artist’s stipend, paid in two installments. The selected artist is ideally based in a location outside the greater Los Angeles area with a keen interest in creating and exhibiting work of artistic and social relevance.

2011 Artist In Residence: Merv Espina
Filipino Video Artist Merv Espina will be in residence at the Echo Park Film Center from August 9 - September 7, 2011 making work, teaching a FREE video workshop to neighborhood youth and presenting a night of contemporary Asian Cinema at the end of his stay. We are honored and excited to have Mr. Espina in Los Angeles to inspire a new generation of media makers and also share his deep knowledge and expertise with regards to world cinema.

2010 Artist In Residence: Joff Winterhart
The 2010 Summer Artist in Residence was be Joff Winterhart of Bristol, England. Joff is an illustrator, film-maker/animator, teacher, drummer, songwriter, t-shirt maker, rock’n roll fan, walker and dog enthusiast. His work has covered various youth projects and community film-making initiatives. During 2007/8 Joff devised and ran A Comics Project - working with young people from difficult backgrounds to make an anthology of their autobiographical comic strips. Most recently co-wrote/animated/wrote songs for Teeth: The Musical, the first ever animated musical to promote dental hygiene, made for/by young people with special needs.  Joff plays one-handed drums with his two-person rock ’n roll band BUCKY. He loves to work with people who are not necessarily from the art or media world. At the moment he is working on Days of the Bagnold Summer - a graphic novel to be published by Random House in 2011.

2009 Artist In Residence: Elena Pardo
Elena Pardo is a Mexican filmmaker who works on experimental animation and documentaries. Her experimental shorts--Juquilita, Nico et la Berlue, Fuego, Tierra, and others--have shown in Mexico, France and US. Elena co-directed El Rey de los Coleaderos (The King of Bull-Tailers), a feature documentary about a Mexican migrant who preserves his charro culture in the LA context. She has participated as director of photography and editor in other documentaries about Mexican migration, human rights and political/social issues; she has also taught camera and editing techniques in various communities of Oaxaca, Mexico. Elena collaborated on singer Lila Downs' visual project: images for concerts and the production of 2 DVDs. Elena is currently working on a short documentary about the urban gentrification of her neighborhood in Mexico City.

2008 Artist In Residence: Dagie Brundert
Dagie Brundert, our fourth Artist In Residence, lives in Berlin where she studied visual communication and experimental filmmaking. In 1994 she joined Ramona Welsh and Pamela Homann to found the female filmmakers’ collective FBI – Frein Berliner Ischen, which put on Super 8 film shows in Berlin for four years. Dagie’s short Super 8 films continue to light up screens and inspire audiences at festivals around the world. Her latest project, Calexico: Next Exit, is a feature-length music documentary created in conjunction with Khani Kahnert. www.dagiebrundert.de/

I was born in a small town in the middle of West Germany. Beautiful nature, but boring after a while... I moved to Berlin and studied art. Fell in love with my super 8 camera (Nizo) in 1988. Since then I try to be a particle-finder, a wave-catcher and a good story-teller. I carry my super 8 camera with me travelling, walking around, eyes open and antennas upright. I try to absorb weird beautiful things from this world. Chew them and spit them out again. Reaching your heart? Sparking off a grin? I’d love to ;-)

2007 Artists In Residence: Derek O’Connor & Maeve Sweeney
Derek O’Connor is a writer from Ireland. He has written for film, TV, theatre, magazines, newspapers and the internet and used to co-manage the Letterkenny Arts Centre in Donegal, Ireland. Maeve Sweeney is a drama teacher from Ireland. She has worked with thousands of young people in classes across Ireland and the US. She also works as a theatrical Stage Manager. Derek and Maeve are currently based in New York City.

2006 Artist In Residence: Heather Harkins, Halifax, NS
Heather Harkins is an animator based in Nova Scotia. Her earliest films were mentored by the late brilliant director Helen Hill. "The 8 Husbands of Zsa Zsa Gabor" (2001) was embraced by feminist audiences, and garnered Heather an invitation to speak at Ladyfest Los Angeles. Soon after, she wintered in Montreal, Quebec, creating "Don't Blink" (2003) for the English Animation Studio of the National Film Board of Canada. Heather has taught animation to adults and youth for the past six years, and has curated short film programs for venues in Vancouver, Amsterdam, Toronto, Los Angeles, and her beloved Halifax. When she isn't working on her next film, she takes her grandmother on long walks, and plays with the alley cat she rescued from the streets of Montreal.

2005 Artist In Residence: Roger Beebe, Gainesville, FL
Roger Beebe is a professor of film and media studies at the University of Florida. He has shown his previous films and videos at McMurdo Station in Antarctica and on the CBS Jumbotron in Times Square as well as scores of less exotic locales (Rotterdam, Ann Arbor, NY Expo, Cinematexas, etc.). He’s won numerous awards at fests including Black Maria, Thaw, the US Super 8 Film + Video Festival, and the Newark Black Film Festival (where he received the 2004 Paul Robeson Award). He also ran Flicker in Chapel Hill from 1997 – 2000 and is currently artistic director of FLEX, the Florida Experimental/Film Video Festival.

Echo Luna:

Echo Luna, a satellite project site of Echo Park Film Center established in 2007, is a traditional rural house with several outbuildings on 3 acres of arable land in the small village of Legedzine, located in central Ukraine. Artists-In-Residence are invited based on compelling past and current work that explores the intersection of art and the environment. Past residents have included American filmmakers Peggy Ahwesh and Keith Sanborn, Georgian filmmaker Gia Diasamidze, drummer David Abduladze (from the Nino Katamadze Band), American documentary filmmaker Lee Anne Schmitt, and Liudi Dobri, a group of young Ukrainians playing traditional music.

The village (population approximately 1000) is uniquely situated in a landscape that combines dynamic elements (an ancient archeological site, a new museum, a communist era cultural center and communal farm, a brick factory, a weekly market, traditional festivals) and a vigorous citizenry (grandmothers, farmers, academics, entrepreneurs and artists). Artists are encouraged to work on projects that engage community members and local resources in order to expand cross-cultural dialogue on global sustainability issues, celebrate cultural traditions, exchange skills and knowledge, and improve village infrastructure.

Filmmakers, farmers, puppeteers, poets, potters, painters, carpenters, musicians, craftspeople, architects, activists and others interested in a future residency at Echo Luna should send a one-page proposal to info@echoparkfilmcenter.org