CHICAGO, IL (June 30, 2008) - Although it is known for being one of the nation’s premiere urban arts and communications schools, Columbia College Chicago might not be the first institution that comes to mind when considering the growing landscape of global marketing.
However, this summer, Columbia College Chicago and FCB Prague, the Czech affiliate of Draftfcb, one of the largest advertising agencies in the world, partnered to create the Summer Session in Prague. The goal of the month-long Global Marketing Workshop, was to expose senior level students to the global marketing issues in the Czech Republic and European Union, (e.g.. energy, immigration, and food pricing, among others).
Of the fourteen students chosen, twelve are Marketing Communications majors, one is studying Arts Entertainment and Media Management, and one student is from the Journalism Department. Each student brings their own individual viewpoint and diverse experience to the month-long program of study.
The relationship between Prague and Columbia College Chicago was initiated seven years ago through the Fiction Writing Department’s on-going Summer Writing Session. This summer marked the first ever study-abroad program for the Marketing Communications Department, further strengthening the Prague/Chicago connection.
The Prague Workshop, which was organized by Department Chair Margaret Sullivan and Associate Chair Tom Hamilton, provided students with access to the expertise of guest lecturers from various facets of the marketing and advertising community, including non-traditional media (Petr Frey, PhD, Director, Integrated Communications, FCB Prague); marketing cultural institutions (Zuzana Hudecová, Account Executive for Karlin Musical Theatre, FCB Prague); similarities and differences between Czech and other European consumers (Matěj Černý, copywriter, FCB Prague); and use of transit advertising in the Czech Republic and Europe (Tomaš Lauko, Strategic Supervisor, Carat Czech Republic).
Liz Gump, Senior Vice President of FCB Prague and a Chicago native, was integral in syllabus development and assembling the guest speakers for the summer program. In addition to her work with FCB Prague, Ms. Gump has been a guest professor of Commercial Communications at University of Economics Prague in the Department of International Relations.
The fourteen Columbia students, all of whom were personally interviewed by Associate Chair Tom Hamilton, engaged Columbia’s “hands-on, minds-on” learning approach during their time in Prague where they applied basic marketing principles to real-life, problem-solving situations with creative professionals. What better way to push the creative envelope than to be immersed in a beautiful city, rich with culture, history, and architecture, to work on an independent project to market a famous Czech glass company, and still finding time to meet with U.S. Ambassador Richard Graber. It seems art and marketing aren’t such strange bedfellows after all. Visit http://cms.colum.edu/prague to read the students’ blog entries.
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CHICAGO, IL (June 27, 2008) Columbia alumnus Jay Boersma (BA, 1974) has five photo-derived pieces included in the Art Institute of Chicago's A Mind at Play, on exhibition now through September 7. His work, which is often humorous, satirizes well-known images from the canon of photographic history.
A Mind at Play features the work of artists who embrace the notion of the viewer’s subjective experience and explore how such perceptions can be manipulated through photography. Images presented in the exhibition examine the realm of photography beyond its basic function of strict recording and challenge the ways in which this medium can illuminate how one perceives reality, notes the exhibition website at http://www.artic.edu/aic/exhibitions/exhibition/mind.
Boersma is Senior Creative Director at Playboy.com and works in Playboy's Chicago headquarters. His photography and graphics can be seen at www.re-vision.com.
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CHICAGO, IL (June 26, 2008) Through a grant from the Open World Cultural Leaders Program, Columbia College Chicago’s master of fine arts in music composition for the screen program recently hosted four Russian composers for a week of cultural exchange, education, and creative work.
Aleksandr Platonovich Manotskov, Anna Dmitriyevna Mikhaylova, Anton Valeryevich Silayev and Dmitry Vladimirovich Ryabtsev enjoyed a two-week residency, June 4 – 18, during which they worked with a team of composers and educators headed by Music Composition for the Screen Director Andrew Hill and Music Composition Professor Ilya Levinson.
The Russian delegation learned state-of-the-art computer scoring programs, screened and analyzed scores from several classic Hollywood films, and scored scenes from movies including two in-production movies, “Clear Cut” and “The Girls of Alden,” by Dalila Droege, an MFA Film & Video student at Columbia. View Droege’s portfolio at www.daliladroege.com
The culmination of the Russian composers’ Open World Cultural Leaders experience was a recording session at Hinge studios on June 15, during which a full orchestra, conducted by Cliff Colnot, recorded the newly composed scores for selected scenes from Droege’s films. Recording musicians include members of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Civic Orchestra, Lyric Opera Orchestra, and the Grant Park Players.
The visitors also enjoyed an immersion into Chicago’s outstanding culinary and cultural scene including visits to the CSO, museums, a dance concert at the Harris Theater, and a theater performance at Steppenwolf.
The visit wrapped up with a film screening and celebratory dinner at The Club at Symphony Center. Present at the dinner were Droege and the Russian composers, dignitaries from the college, and Jeanne Whitney Smith of Open World, who came to Chicago from Washington D.C. for the event, as well as F. Daniel Cantrell, representing the office of Illinois Congressman Danny Davis.
At the dinner, the composers thanked the Columbia educators for an education and enriching experience and emphasized the value of the Open World Cultural Exchange program, praising the funding organization for making the educational and cultural experience possible.
Open World’s Cultural Leaders Program aims to forge better understanding between the United States and Russia by enabling emerging Russian leaders in the arts to experience America’s cultural and community life, and to work with their American counterparts. Support for the cultural program is provided through partnership and funding from the National Endowment for the Arts; the Open World Leadership Center funds the administrative portion of the program.
Open World is a unique, nonpartisan initiative of the U.S. Congress. Delegates range from judges to mayors, from innovative nonprofit directors to experienced journalists, and from political party activists to regional administrators. Over 10,500 Open World participants have been hosted in all 50 U.S. states since the program’s inception in 1999. Open World is managed by the Open World Leadership Center, an independent legislative branch entity headquartered at the Library of Congress in Washington. Open World is the brain child of Librarian of Congress James H. Billington and members of Congress led by Senator Ted Stevens of Arkansas. More information at www.openworld.gov
Pictured above left to right: Alexsandr Platonovich Manotskov, Dmitry Vladimirovich Ryabtsev, Dalila Droege, Anton Valeryevich Silayev, Anna Dmitriyevna Mikhaylova.-end-
CHICAGO, IL (June 10) – The city’s Community Development Commission today unanimously voted to recommend to the City Council the sale of a parcel of land on the southwest corner of 16th and State to Columbia College Chicago for the construction of a Media Production Center. The project, designed by Studio Gang Architects, is the first new construction for the college.
The 38,000 square foot building will feature two sound stages, a motion capture studio, animation lab, classrooms and space for production design, costumes and more. Total project budget is $21 million.
Officials at the college have worked closely with Third Ward Alderman Patricia Dowell, to ensure that the facility will be a good fit with the primarily residential character of the area.
“I am delighted to support the sale of city-owned land to help create the Media Production Center for Columbia College. We are proud to have this leading educational institution expand into the South Loop in the Third Ward. With this facility, Columbia will be able to meet the educational needs of our future filmmakers and visual artists,” said Alderman Pat Dowell. “I continue to work with Columbia to assure minority hiring and contracting for this project, provide community access to the facility and address parking needs.”
“The redevelopment of this long-vacant parcel of land is important to the ongoing revitalization of the South Loop neighborhood,” said Department of Planning and Development Commissioner Arnold Randall. “With its unique design and environmental features, the Center will become a tremendous asset to the community and the city as a whole.”
W.E. O’Neil Construction Co., the firm selected to bring Studio Gang’s architectural designs into being, has a history of working on similar high quality and unique projects. They also have extensive experience working with local communities and the firm has been instrumental in developing the Construction Career Opportunities Program at Dawson Technical Institute. O’Neil has pledged to provide five apprentice construction jobs to graduates of this program.
“W.E. O’Neil Team is excited to be included with Columbia College and their entire team in the planning and development of this unique facility,” says Michael Faron, chairman of W.E. O’Neil Construction Co.
Studio Gang is headed by Jeanne Gang, designer of the much-anticipated Aqua tower. Gang, who was the principal designer of Columbia’s MPC, was recently featured in a Chicago Tribune article by architecture critic Blair Kamin. Kamin dubbed Gang a “rising ‘starchitect,’” and credited her with “a gift for coaxing visual poetry out of the most prosaic materials.” Ms. Gang and the work of her firm are also featured in the June issue of Metropolis magazine.
Gang will present a program on her design at a Chicago Architecture Foundation free Lunchtime Lecture on Wednesday, June 18 at 12:15 p.m., 224 S. Michigan.
Regarding Gang’s design for the MPC, Alicia Berg, vice president for campus environment, says that, “working with Studio Gang, we have designed an environmentally sustainable building with a distinctive and significantly transparent façade that will be an asset to the emerging neighborhood. Jeanne and her team have worked with us to keep design elements consistent with the fresh, creative approach that is the hallmark of Columbia College.”
As plans move ahead for the MPC, anticipation mounts for students and faculty. “Columbia College Chicago is very excited to be in the midst of planning and fundraising for the Media Production Center, the college’s first new construction project,” says Columbia President Warrick L. Carter, Ph.D. “The Center will provide students with a state-of-the-art professional production facility that will enable Columbia – one of the top ten film schools – to remain competitive in our increasingly technological environment.”
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(CHICAGO, IL) As home to the largest film school in the nation, Columbia College Chicago can also boast that it hosts some of the most au courant film festivals as well. The CineYouth Festival, hosted this year by Columbia, showcases work by filmmakers under the age of 20. This year’s Festival features screenings of 100 films from across the country as well as workshops, panels and performances. The CineYouth Festival (formerly Future Filmmakers Festival) produced by Cinema/Chicago, the presenting organization of the 44th Chicago International Film Festival, will kick-off with an Opening Night Celebration on Friday June 20, 2008 at 7 p.m., with the conference continuing on June 20 and 21.
The June 20 kick off will screen the film Girls Rock! directed by Shane King, who made his first film at the age of 12. The screening will be followed by a discussion with King. Girls Rock!, which opened this past March, documents the experiences of girls who participated in a girls-only rock ‘n roll camp.
“There is a sense of empowerment in hearing your voice through a microphone for the first time,” says one of the camp counselors in the film. “You can’t underestimate how it feels to have your voice echo through a room.”
The mission of the Girls Rock! camp depicted in the film is for young girls to hear their voices, both figuratively and literally. Images of young girls shrilly screaming until their faces are red in a kind of emotional purgative is at first glance comedic, but as the scream is held for more than 5, 6, 7 seconds, it becomes a cry for something deeper. To see these same girls thrashing on guitars and taking the stance of the ‘girl rocker’ in songs that they have written themselves is an image of pure liberation.
One statistic that is quoted in the film’s trailer says, “The number one wish of teenage girls is to lose weight.” The film makes a point of this statistic not because obesity is a major problem with teens in America, but because it is so incredibly sad that girls feel that unless they are thin they are not allowed to have ambitions beyond their bodies.
One of the most striking moments in the film is to hear a girl talk about how much she hates herself and to later talk about her transformation after attending rock and roll camp.
“I’ve been waiting for so long to finally admit to myself that I am amazing and I really am,” she says. “Everyone is beautiful in their own way and they get even better when they decide to be powerful and they decide to rock!”
After the film, Ron Falzone, Film Professor and Directing Area Coordinator at Columbia College, will moderate a discussion with Shane King. The post-screening reception will include a performance by local youth rock band Ursa Minor, whose oldest member is 15. The band members met at summer rock camp.
CineYouth Festival will be held at Columbia’s Film Row Cinema and all of the screenings, workshops and filmmaking panels are free and open to the public. RSVP to marketing@chicagofilmfestival.com. Seating will be on a first come, first served basis and is limited to theater capacity. To register for the workshops, email cineyouth@chicagofilmfestival.com. For more information about the CineYouth Festival and schedule of events, visit www.chicagofilmfestival.com or call Cinema/Chicago offices at 312-683-0121 x117.
Cinema/Chicago is a not-for-profit, cultural and education organization dedicated to encouraging better understanding between cultures and its people and to making a positive contribution to the art form of the moving image. The CineYouth Festival is part of the year-round programs presented by Cinema/Chicago, which also include the Chicago International Film Festival, Summer and Fall Gala, International Summer Screenings, Intercom Competition, Hugo Television Awards, Black Perspectives and Educational Outreach.
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