The Spark Arts Festival's latest addition? A mini, mini-film fest
Chattanooga has a habit of launching new initiatives, events and festivals during one of the many established fixtures on the arts, outdoors and music calendars.
The next venture capitalizes on the groundswell of film activity in the Scenic City and the second year of the all-in-one Spark Arts Festival: the mini, mini-film festival, the Local Hero Project.
Rather than bringing in the industry’s big titles or screening feature-length films, the pint-sized festival within a festival turns the lens inward on Chattanooga filmmakers—professional and amateur—and the outdoor scene.
The guidelines are simple: three minutes in length, capturing some facet of the immense scope of the area’s outdoor offerings, be it on the water, in the woods, in the air, or in a cave and filmed in high definition.
“Native adrenaline junkies can enter their epic waterfall drops, gravity-defying attainment moves on cliffs or catching air off a single-track ‘launch rock,’” Jeff Styles, local radio personality and one of the festival’s organizers, said in a prepared statement. “But kinder, gentler types can also enter more genteel, thoughtful fare. As long as it’s three minutes long and outdoor-centric, you’re in.”
As Facebook, Instagram and Twitter can attest, most adventurers and even mild-mannered hikers are keen to share the highlights of their epic or idyllic moments spent in the great outdoors, moments when they were heroes in nature.
The submissions will be played on a loop at the downtown Mellow Mushroom on Thursday, April 11 at 5 p.m. The new take on the evening screening will kick off the larger festival, which runs through Sunday, April 21.
The Spark Arts Festival, known as HATCH Chatt in 2012, is a multimedia and multiday showcase of visual, performing and literary arts in and beyond Chattanooga with a mission of collaboration, advocacy and accessibility.
The 4 Bridges Arts Festival and the 2013 Celebration of Southern Literature serve as bookends for the festival, which will also include the Scenic City Paint Out and the Chattanooga Theatre Centre’s production “How to Become a Pirate.”
Submissions for the Local Hero Project should be uploaded online or presented in person to L2 Boards by Friday, April 5.
