BLACK (4:05)
Created by Brian Gonzalez
Featuring Steven Vega and Rachel Wheeler
Music by Tim Hecker
Hair & Makeup by Brian Gonzalez
Additional crew: Jonathan Henry

SYNOPSIS:
Black (4:25) was created by Brian Gonzalez and features Steven Vega and Rachel Wheeler. In a dry, desolate world, two figures find one another, one blind, one silent, and as they embrace, their kiss grows into a dark, addictive disease that neither can separate from. Music by Tim Hecker.

CONTRIBUTOR BIOS:

Brian Gonzalez
www.taxiplasm.net
Brian Gonzalez began his film career as a sophomore in high school as an active member of the SAYSi Media Arts program in San Antonio, Texas, with roots in video art. In 2005, at age seventeen, he shot his feature film as Director of Photography, La Tragedia de Macario, which gathered acclaim at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival, SXSW Film Festival and more. That fall he began attending the School of Visual Arts (SVA) in New York City. His first freshman film Positive, won the FYI (Film Your Issue) Film Festival with Oscar Winner George Clooney as the president of the jury and was awarded at the UN by Ellen Burstyn. The film was later featured on mtvU, PBS online and IFC’s Media Labs. The following summer he shot his second feature film, Clemente while directing shorts based on Gabriel Garcia Marquez short stories. In his thesis year at SVA, Gonzalez took influence from light installation artist Olafur Eliasson, sculptor and performance artist Zhang Huan and installation artist Rebecca Horn, to achieve entirely new aesthetics in the films he photographed, which earned him Outstanding Achievement in Cinematography at SVA’s Dusty Film Festival; awarded by Oscar-winner Robert Elswit, ASC.

Since graduating with honors from SVA in 2009, Gonzalez has worked predominantly as an Assistant Camera for various features, shorts with award-winning filmmakers from Michael Cuesta to Dee Rees as well as music videos and commercials for companies such as ESPN and Maybelline. At the same time he began doing promotional video work with Atlantic Records, filming recording artists like Jay-Z, Alicia Keys, Halestorm, Fanfarlo and more. In November 2009 however, Gonzalez took time off to embrace a month-long artist residency at the Robert Wilson Watermill Center for Performance Art in Southampton where he collaborated with a creative team on Harbor, a large-scale video art piece inspired by Butoh dancing; attendants at the opening included singer Rufus Wainwright and funders included art patron Isabella Rossellini, writer Jonathan Safron Foer, David Bowie and more. For three years Gonzalez has also been a camera operator at Mercedes-Benz New York Fashion Week and in the beginning of 2010 he began directing fashion-inspired video pieces. He is currently directing more music videos and conceptual non-fiction films for Atlantic Records, including Get Me Out of My Mind for Panic! At the Disco and is committed to developing his own high-concept video art fusing light installation, performance art and fashion.

Tim Hecker
http://www.sunblind.net/
Tim Hecker is a Canadian-based musician and sound artist, born in Vancouver. Since 1996, he has produced a range of audio works for Kranky, Alien8, Mille Plateaux, Room40, Force Inc, Staalplaat, and Fat Cat. His works have been described as “structured ambient”, “tectonic color plates” and “cathedral electronic music”. More to the point, he has focused on exploring the intersection of noise, dissonance and melody, fostering an approach to songcraft, which is both physical and emotive. The New York Times has described his work as “foreboding, abstract pieces in which static and sub-bass rumbles open up around slow moving notes and chords, like fissures in the earth waiting to swallow them whole”. His Harmony in Ultraviolet received critical acclaim, including being recognized by Pitchfork as a top recording of 2006. Radio Amor was also recognized as a key recording of 2003 by Wire magazine. His work has also included commissions for contemporary dance, sound-art installations, as well as various writings. He currently resides in Montreal.