The Front Yard film screening series features seasonally changing projected media art programs, highlighting the work of Western New York artists. The inaugural program revolves around the theme of communities: trust, coinciding with The 2023 Buffalo Humanities Festival. Presentations will begin after dark each night and will run for three months.

Communities: Trust, guest curated by Dorothea Braemer, Lukia Costello, and  Meg Knowles, tackles the topic of community and trust through the lens of the diverse perspectives of 10 regional media artists. Tammy McGovern’s and Steven Ansell’s Autostorm presents a notion of community disappeared into the confines of our cars. Kyla Kegler’s Monster Society performatively studies alienation and finding ways to approach community. Her Own Hero by Lukia Costello and the late Tilke Hill tackles the history of women’s self-defense, and Harlem Nights by Kaitlyn Lowe celebrates the community of radical artists of the Harlem Renaissance in the form of a visual poem.  In Savage Future, Terry Jones interrogates the American-Indian boarding school experience and in Mrs. Snow, Annette Daniels-Taylor explores the mindset of a mid-century  African-American domestic worker.  Olurotimi Akanbi’sUrban Transitions draws attention to the contrast between communities in urban and rural landscapes in and around Buffalo, while Edreys Wajed’s The Sidewalk imagines community from the perspective of a sidewalk on Buffalo’s East Side. Interwoven throughout the program are pieces by Phil Hastings and David Mawer. Three pieces from Phil Hasting’s poetic fragmentum series metaphorically address community through evocative studies of humans and nature.  Seven playful geometric studies from David Mawer reference landing sequences and the pull of gravity through patterns of undulating dots, lines and shapes, sometimes superimposed over maps.

Dorothea Braemer and Meg Knowles are filmmakers and professors in the media production major at Buffalo State University, and Lukia Costello, also a filmmaker, is the founding director of the Spark Filmmaker Collaborative and the Micromania Film Festival.

Communities: Trust – Program Order and Credits: 

Tammy McGovern & Steven Ansell – Autostorm, 2023  

Kyla Kegler – Monster Society, 2022

David Mawer – Lerp Puppet Strings, No. 1, 2023

Philip Hastings –  fragmentum 62 (c), 2017

David Mawer – Landing Sequence (for an Interdimensional Fleet), No. 3, 2023

Lukia Costello and Tilke Hill - Her Own Hero, 2022

David Mawer – Algorithm for a Gravity Wave: Dots, 2023

Kaitlyn Lowe – Harlem Nights, 2022

Phil Hastings – fragmentum 37 (b), 2018

David Mawer – Landing Sequence (for an Interdimensional Fleet), No. 2, 2023

Terry Jones – Savage Future, 2022

Annette Daniels-Taylor – Mrs. Snow, 2017, 2018

David Mawer – Landing Sequence (for an Interdimensional Fleet), No. 1, 2023

Olurotimi Akanbi – Urban Transitions, 2022

David Mawer – Algorithm for a Gravity Wave: Grid, 2023

Phil Hastings – fragmentum 43 (b), 2019

David Mawer – Landing Sequence (for an Interdimensional Fleet), No. 4, 2023

Edreys Wajed – The Sidewalk, 2018

TRT: 32 mins 48 seconds