Presentation & Preview of El Gallo: Special Episode PEPE KID

Please join us for a FREE Film Presentation & Screening with FACUNDO INTERNATIONAL

6:00 PM, El Gallo Reception – Free parking available behind the Louisiana Humanities Center.

6:30 PM, Facundo International film presentation & Panel Discussion – “How Community Cinema Killed Hollywood”

Let’s face it, things are not going to be changing drastically in Hollywood anytime soon. Stories that disregard race, and that offer entirely new viewpoints and represent the rich medley of cultures in the US, are not going to be the norm in the next five years. Is that depressing? Only if you’re still thinking that Hollywood is the only place that can produce and distribute high quality entertainment. Welcome to the new Hollywood; the one that exists right there in your backyard.

This short panel talks about the theories and the experiences of El Gallo’s team in the production of their independent Series.   The goal of the panel is to foster a debate on how a community: artists, audiences, and local businesses, can work together in finding ways to bypass the burden of standard financing and distribution–closing the door to the Hollywood dream and creating the beginnings of self-sustained high quality local entertainment.  Guest Panelists: Facundo International Producers Sergio Carvajal, Romina Olson and Alejandro Yrausqui.

7:00 PM, Screening of EL GALLO: Special Episode “PEPE KID”

EL GALLO: PEPE KID (El Gallo: Niño Gallo) is a compelling story about a young boy who finds a magical rooster that helps him figure out who he really is. PEPE KID a stand alone short film from Facundo International’s EL GALLO SERIES – an independent, multi-channel experience taking place in Austin, Texas, where different media are used to show the journey of a golden rooster, Sietecueros, and the characters he encounters. (45 minutes, Spanish with English subtitles.)   There will be a Q&A with El Gallo producers following the screening.

Hosted by  Antenna Gallery, Bywater Bed & Breakfast, Charitable Film Network, Facundo International, Las Americas Film Network, and Puentes New Orleans / LATINOLA.

For More Information contact mail@charitablefilmnetwork or info@iamfacundo.com. Please visit www.iamfacundo.com!

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FACUNDO INTERNATIONAL PRODUCERS:

El Gallo Producer Sergio Carvajal. Photo courtesy Facundo International.

Sergio Carvajal is a Venezuelan-American artist, filmmaker, performer and songwriter. He has written and directed an array of narrative, documentary, and experimental shorts which have been featured in festivals such as Tribeca, SXSW, Traverse City, among many others.

Romina Olson:
Romina or a more literal translation “Little Rome” was a born and raised in Austin,TX. Although thanks to her Italian mother Antonella, she has been fortunate to traveled to Italy every year since she was one years old.

After receiving her BFA in Photography from Texas State University-San Marcos, she began taking stills for student films at the University of Texas RFT dept. There she met Sergio Carvajal and joined his team for El Gallo a few years later. Her position in EL Gallo was Associate producer, but in addition Romina did wardrobe, set design, second camera operator, and production stills. “Every step of the way in El Gallo has been a blessing and a huge learning experience. I’ll never forget it and I hope this movement that Sergio is creating has an impact on our society, that will change the way we distribute films and finance artists in general.”

Alejandro Yrausquin:
Alejandro Yrausquin Gudino is a Texas born, Venezuelan raised Mechanical Engineer with a passion for the arts and social activism. Raised by a mother who worked as a community leader and organizer in the south of Venezuela, Alejandro learned from a young age to value the true rewards of social activism; It wasn’t the recognition of the public, which his mother never truly had, but the feeling at the end of the day, while soaked in sweat, that if you follow your heart and you do with love what you think is right for society, then every day becomes a small success.

Alejandro made his incursions in the arts along with his childhood friend, Sergio Carvajal, whom he met in Venezuela at Age 10. They teamed up since they were teenagers, to produce a great number of art initiatives in Venezuela, and later in Austin, TX; city where they moved in their early twenties. The team broke off in 2006, as Alejandro moved to Houston to focus in his career of Engineering. On that time period, he supported art in any way possible, with the relentless belief that art is a primary necessity, right along with food and shelter. 4 years later, he was approached by Sergio to join him on the producing team of an idea called El Gallo, a multichannel production that combined multiple mediums, combined with a unique social activist approach; Alejandro saw this as the perfect opportunity to combine everything he loved, and therefore jumped to the chance.

One year and a half ago we started a project called El Gallo, with the idea of creating a series that could go way beyond the usual Hispanic stereotypes portrayed by Media. The tricky part here was that we didn’t believe that this could be a series that could be sold to standard media; we felt that to distribute it, and finance it through standard channels went against the entire principle of doing something different. We felt that the only way of doing these series was by finding ways of re-igniting the concept of Community Cinema, and do something local, that is financed locally, and distributed locally.One year later, after a million different experiences, we want to share what we have found out through the process.

Thus, our goal with this tour, is to ignite a debate throughout Texas and Louisiana, specially those with large minority communities regarding the concept of New Community Cinema. We believe that technology, and widely available higher education in the areas of content creation are enabling media makers to produce high quality content like never before.

“Nonetheless, everyone is still dependent on the networks and cable to get their content; even though, everyone knows the proven impact that media has on a society, and their decision-making process. We still consume stories that are coming from LA and other Major media hubs, that do not represent what’s happening in our communities on a daily basis. We even open the doors to LA based companies to come into our towns, and lower their production costs, while never demanding for them to portray our communities in accurate ways… or even, demanding that all productions made in our cities actually tell the stories about who we are. Is this because we want to, or because we don’t have another choice… or because we don’t think that another choice could exist? That’s what we’re hoping to explore with this tour.

To do so we hope to interview people along the way, and share the results with everyone as we plant the seed of a possible change. We believe that choices could be created but they require a collective effort of media makers, small businesses, local government, and local audiences. However…. is that even possible?  – Facundo International