Sundance

Klip Collective has much to look forward to during the upcoming 2014 Sundance Film Festival. The creative production shop has been commissioned to turn their massive projections into a pre-roll trailer that will play before every film screening at the Festival. To top it off, for the third year, Klip Collective will also participate in the Festival’s New Frontier presentation with the premiere of their projection installation What’s He Projecting in There? (The Projectionist)

After the success of Klip Collective’s large-scale installation at last year’s festival, Sundance asked the collective to create a trailer commemorating the Film Festival’s 30-year anniversary. The 3D video-mapped narrative features clips from iconic films including Reservoir Dogs, Clerks, Little Miss Sunshine and Beasts of the Southern Wild projected onto the exterior of the Egyptian Theatre. Klip Collective created the site-specific projection map to highlight the architecture of the Egyptian not only as the canvas, but also as the inspiration. Incorporating certain parts of the theatre façade into the narrative, the history of the Festival’s three decades rolls on before viewers’ eyes in all its projection splendor. Take a look at the behind-the-scenes video of the projection for the trailer here:

Sundance was so pleased with the trailer that they commissioned Klip Collective to create a similar project as part of New Frontier program. After brainstorming with New Frontier curator Shari Frilot, the Klip Collective team set out to create an artistic narrative projection on par with the groundbreaking material New Frontier is known for. The concept behind 2014’s piece ) expands upon Klip Collective’s much-buzzed about immersive installation from last year’s Festival. By using the same actor and essentially the same creative team, shares the same vibe and pace as its predecessor, while also creating a visual bridge to the pre-roll trailer.

This experiential art installation is a parable of the projectionist, the unsung hero of cinema. The piece begins with the similar neon lights and film clips as the trailer, before the panels move away to expose the room behind the wall: the theatre’s projection booth. A tale of the mysterious projectionist unfolds, before the walls close back up, patterns from the trailer continue, and everything returns to how it was before.

Klip Collective’s Creative Director Ricardo Rivera explains that the projection is a “love story to the festival.” He voices the excitement of the team to be so involved with the Festival in 2014, “I feel like this year is the big year for us. Like others before us, Sundance gave Klip Collective a chance, pushed us to do more and has facilitated that growth. We started in a basement on Main Street, went big last year, and now we are center stage right on the Egyptian, not to mention having our piece before EVERY film this year. The amount of love and encouragement and respect that has come from Sundance blows my mind. Creatively, we really are getting pushed into a new uncharted space. I feel like pushing the boundaries of narrative and projection mapping is something that few are doing. It's hard. But we're pushing it because we believe in it. Where it goes? We'll all have to see.”

"Technology continues to drive discovery and evolution in the media arts," comments Klip Collective Executive Producer Pier Nicola D'Amico. "To see video escape the confines of the rectilinear screen and be embraced on a stage like Sundance will only continue to inspire artists to find ways of expression that can be viewed in the real topographical world, rather than solely in the traditional spaces of museums and art galleries."