The Cinema Cabaret - This Sunday at The Velaslavasay Panorama

Tonight ten poet-performers take on the movies by writing scripts that re-tell scenes from seven feature films, using them to repackage aspects of the history of our continent.

The practice of counter-dubbing films with alternate soundtracks became ubiquitous in the 20th century. But almost from the beginning of cinema live orators and narrators were available to mediate the image on the screen, either for documentary films without inter-titles, or for imported films whose titles were in a foreign language, or indeed in Japan where the film industry grew around the star status of the benshi narrators, creating films designed to be narrated live by the actors who wrote the tale and voiced the characters.

Sometimes called "movie telling" or "neo-benshi" or glossed as performance art, the seven pieces tonight will take scenes from different feature films and torque them with sometimes comic, critical, or poetic interpretations, all relating in some way to the history, or alternate history, of North America. Short scenes from Robocop, Gravity, The Sound of Music, Chinatown and others will be retold by:

The Velaslavasay Panorama is pleased to announce that our Founding Director Sara Velas was recently elected as President of the International Panorama Council during the 23rd annual International Panorama Conference in Altötting, Germany in September. The first American to hold this position, Ms. Velas is also the first woman and artist to lead the organization.

Founded in 1992 in Szeged, Hungary as a volunteer special interest group focused on heritage (pre-WWII) panoramas in Europe, the organization has since expanded to include panoramas & participants from around the world. The IPC promotes professional trusteeship, worldwide research and shared knowledge of historic and contemporary panoramas. 

After twenty successful years of all-volunteer work on establishing a global network of panorama enthusiasts and professionals, in 2010 the International Panorama Council began the process of formalization into a Membership Association, to act as an international nongovernmental, nonprofit organization.  Updated information on the activities of the IPC can be found through their website, http://panoramacouncil.org

Participants in the 23rd IPC Conference gather at the Jerusalem Panorama Rotunda in Altötting, Germany- September 11, 2014.  (Photo: Patrick Deicher) 

The IPC invites individuals with significant interest in the panorama and its related artforms & technologies to join as members for 50 euro annually. Institutional Memberships are also available for panoramas & museums with related interests, to promote the panoramic art form, past, present & future. All members receive a quarterly newsletter featuring news and innovations in the world of panoramas and become part of a global network of experts in the field of panoramas.