The Black Maria Film Festival is an international festival traveling across the US each year exhibiting short works by independent filmmakers.
The festival exhibits the work of diverse, passionate, exceptional, independent, non-commercial, emerging as well as veteran film and video makers from the US, and across the globe. These artists represent an under-served constituency of the arts community who might not otherwise have the opportunity for live public exhibition statewide, nationwide, and worldwide. We focus on short films including those which address issues and struggles within contemporary society. This year the festival program includes provocative works based on environmental responsibility, race and class, family, women’s rights, sustainability, immigration, rituals surrounding death and loss, and much more.
The festival also reaches out to audiences in settings including colleges, museums, libraries, community organizations, media organizations, and religious organizations, with custom-curated touring programs. This cutting edge, cross-genre work explores the aesthetic and communication potential of media, and in so doing, honors the vision of Thomas Edison, NJ inventor and creator of the motion picture. It was his studio, the world’s first, from which we take our name.
The 33rd Annual Black Maria Film and Video Festival and tour is made possible in part by:
New Jersey City University
New Jersey State Council on the Arts
National Endowment for the Arts
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
The Donner Philanthropic Fund of the Pikes Peak Community Foundation
Microsoft Corporation
Adobe Systems, Inc.
TechSoup Global
Individual Donations
The Black Maria Film and Video Festival is a project of the Thomas A. Edison Media Arts Consortium, an independent non-profit organization based at New Jersey City University. The festival was launched in 1981 with the endorsement of the Thomas Edison National Historic Park in West Orange, NJ.
To become a sponsor of the Black Maria Film and Video Festival, please contact the consortium’s office or make a donation via the festival website: www.blackmariafilmfestival.org.
Thomas A. Edison Media Arts Consortium
Black Maria Film and Video Festival
c/o Department of Media Arts – Fries Hall - NJCU
2039 Kennedy Blvd., Jersey City, NJ 07305
201.200.2043
[email protected]
As we embark upon the 38th annual festival tour of the Black Maria Film Festival, I am proud to have the opportunity to showcase the work of so many gifted, creative, and visionary film and videomakers.
This season we received extraordinary work from across the United States and the world including Canada, Germany, Poland, Spain, Cypress, Greece, Brazil, France, South Korea, the Netherlands, the UK, Argentina, Australia, Italy, Switzerland, Singapore, Japan, and from right here in our own backyard, NJ.
Since 1981, the mission of the Thomas A. Edison Media Arts Consortium - the Black Maria Film and Video Festival, has been to promote, illuminate, and advocate innovation in the art of the moving image. The consortium has passionately embraced this mission for over thirty years.
We focus on diverse short films - narrative, experimental, animation, and documentary - including those, which address issues and struggles within contemporary society. These exceptional works, ranging from comedy to drama to the exploration of pure form in film and video, are the heart and soul of the Black Maria.
We have all heard the clichés and assumptions often made about filmmakers working in the short form. Most typical is that the work is meant to be a "calling card" primarily to gain access to the world of commercial feature length film. Not true for the filmmakers who continue to push the boundaries of the moving image and who have exhibited their work for decades in the Black Maria. We appreciate and celebrate the short form in all its permutations for its artistic challenges, aesthetics, and substance.
My sincere thanks to our jurors, trustees, sponsors, donors, supporters, volunteers, and most importantly to the artists who continue to inspire us.
Jane Steuerwald-Executive Director
