WJTalk - MOCA

The View From Here

2008-03-28T19:26:28Z

The Chinatown Film Project is about re-seeing Chinatown. Through the eyes of filmmakers all over the world. Namely because we don't always appreciate, or even notice, what's right in front of us. Last week, it took someone else's admiration of the views from my Chinatown apartment to re-see what's right in front of me.

The view from my office, at twilight:

Eight stories up, I peeked this outside my bedroom window:

Finding Quiet

2008-03-17T18:55:02Z

Manhattan's Chinatown is the hardest-working neighborhood in a city of workaholics. Finding quiet spaces to relax, and create something other than green, is rare. Even meals are eaten in a cacophony of other people working. Tomorrow I head out to California, where the sunshine perhaps relaxes people's ambitions a tad. But before I go, a couple snapshots of quiet leisure in Chinatown.

Silk Road Cafe has the best coffee in Chinatown. I come here for meetings a lot. Last week, I spied some teens chilling out front, kids who would blend in unnoticed on Bedford Ave, but here, generate double takes.

Barrio Chino, at Orchard and Broome, is Chinatown only in name. Twelve minutes to walk from my Chinatown crib to the Loisaida's re-interpretation. Theirs involves expanses of wood and brick, and a place to sit quietly in the sunlight.

Around Chinatown - Feb. 29, 2008

2008-03-07T18:48:08Z

I live in Chinatown. And I work 3 blocks away, in Chinatown.
Chinatown figures quite heavily into my everyday life.
A few scenes, then, from the prior week...

When I woke up one Wednesday, this is what I saw out my window. Chinatown provides poetry in the most mundane.

I've walked past this display window on the Bowery at least 300 times. Why this night I chose to notice this fantastical creation - a brightly-lit-color-chameleon
-giant-disco ball - beckoning a sleeping Chinatown to revelry, is a mystery to me.

Snow mutes everything. February has been mercifully warm. A few hours later turned this pretty dusting into grayish slush.

Happy New Year!

2008-02-20T15:59:59Z

Happy New Year! I fell asleep to the sound of drumming on Feb 6 and awoke to the scene below. I've celebrated Chinese New Year in LA and SF before, but this was the first time I found myself in Manhattan's Chinatown on the 1st day of the lunar calendar. And NYC's Chinatown is still celebrating. It's Feb 16, and the drums are still beating and the dragons still dancing...

MoCA on TRACE

2007-11-26T17:39:38Z

Here's a link to a recent blog entry where I talk about films, MoCA, and rainforests. Big thanks to Alex Steed for the write-up. According to their website, TRACE is a TRANSCULTURAL Styles and Ideas magazine - a perfect host, then, for musings about our Chinatown Film Project.

http://blog.trace212.com/archives/363#more-363

And a photo snapped in the old Chinese Benevolent Association in Kingston's former Chinatown. Get this - the Chinese community is so integrated in Jamaica, that there is no Chinatown. Not only have the Chinese in Jamaica integrated racially, linguistically, and culturally - Bob Marley's first producer was Chinese - but, after arriving as indentured servants, Chinese Jamaicans now represent the moneyed elite.

I wonder why the Chinese immigrant experience was so different in Jamaica than anywhere else.

-- Karin Chien

Event Flyer

2007-09-24T17:48:16Z

Celebrate our YouTube Channel Launch!

2007-09-20T17:52:31Z

We are throwing a bash next Thursday, September 27, in the heart of downtown New York City to launch our YouTube Channel. Our associate producer, Jill Aguado, and MoCA's director of public programs, Nancy Bulalacao, have assembled a knockout lineup of hiphop emcees, spoken word performers, and DJs. We're also showing a new video from the animated Chinatown feature, "Year of the Fish" by David Kaplan, a stunningly beautiful film that debuted at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year.

Please join us for this very special, one-night only event. If the action gets too hot downstairs, there's a rooftop lounge to cool down on upstairs.

If you have problems reading this, go to www.thinkingmandesign.com/MoCA/LaunchParty.html

HAVE YOU VISITED OUR YOUTUBE CHANNEL YET?

2007-08-29T00:23:31Z

Check it out! Our first video submitted and posted on MoCA's YouTube channel. It's an informative piece on Chinatown in Hawaii, the only state in the Union where Asian food products rule the local drugstore's snack section.

www.youtube.com/mocanyc

Also, we just got word that The Delancey, a cool LES spot with a badass rooftop lounge, will host our hiphop-spoken word party celebrating the YouTube Channel:

SAVE THE DATE! Part II Launch Party on SEPTEMBER 27, 2007 from 8pm-1am @ The Delancey, 168 Delancey in NYC!

Barrio Chino in the DF

2007-08-14T19:03:23Z

Some pics from a quick trip down to Mexico City this past weekend. Chinatown basically amounts to competing Mexican-Chinese buffets along Calle Dolores, but the colors and lanterns are pretty to look at.

-Karin Chien

What Does Chinatown Look Like to You?

2007-08-09T04:01:54Z

Hi. Thank you for reading the first entry (and my first blog entry ever) of the Museum of Chinese in the Americas (MoCA) Chinatown Film Project blog! (Wow, a mouthful - hopefully I won’t have to say that out loud).

I’m Karin Chien, the curator and producer of the Project, and I’ll be posting behind-the-scenes insights about the Project. Complete with pics, mixed with tidbits about life in NYC Chinatown, and peppered with surprise guest entries.

So what exactly is this blog and Project about?

The Chinatown Film Project is a 3-part, 2-year program premiering next Spring at MoCA’s sparkling new space that the fabulous Maya Lin is designing. We are commissioning 10 NYC directors to make original short films about Chinatown. Then, we’re going to commission 10 filmmakers from around the world, think Paris or Havana, to make films about Chinatowns in their cities. But we’re also opening the pot to everyone else – MoCA’s YouTube-hosted channel will allow anyone to upload films they’ve made about Chinatown.

I’ll be posting more about our 10 select filmmakers, but I’d first like to shout-out a film on our YouTube site, www.youtube.com/mocanyc. We posted a reference video called “Take A Look” by Kevin Lee. It’s a short doc about the impact of 9/11 on NYC Chinatown, made right after 9/11 when mainstream media was busy ignoring this community. Kevin’s “Take A Look” embodies the DIY spirit of the Project – grab a camera, shoot something, and show the rest of us what Chinatown looks like to you. What are you waiting for?

P.S. And props to the Chinese World Journal for having the incredible foresight to sponsor this Project!