Columbus Day: An American Farce — a documentary

Columbus Day: An American Farce — a documentary, is a collaborative feature length project in preproduction between Torry Mendoza and Terrance Houle. It exists near the fringe of mockumentary, although it is a genuine documentary exploring important issues of contention, and is established in the depths of satire. This documentary aims to examine the perpetuation of this myth while it continues to be observed as an American Holiday and persists as fact in American history. While exploring its pedagogical roots and historical inaccuracy, Columbus Day: An American Farce will utilize man-on-the-street interviews, along with interviews from academic administrators at the primary, secondary and post-secondary education systems within New York State, as well as interviews with various members and groups from the Italian-American community (Knights of Columbus and the Sons of Italy). The documentary will also approach various members of the American government in an effort to realize the continued perpetuation of a man who not only didn't "discover" America, but was a criminal and perpetrator of genocide as one of America's "own." Columbus Day also resolves to answer the question, "What does Columbus Day mean to you?" and "How do you celebrate Columbus Day?"

Interviews will be conducted by interdisciplinary media artist and Blackfeet Native, Terrance "TJ" Houle as his Indigenous identity, Iiniiwahkiimah (pronounced: ee-nee-wah-kee-mah) or Buffalo Herder. Dressed in only part of his regalia, Iiniiwahkiimah dons a vest -- no shirt, a breachcloth -- no leggings, mocassins and roach with Houle's signature black rimmed glasses. Houle's articulate eloquence and intellectual presence stands in stark contrast to cinema's widely accepted constructs of Native stereotypes.

Columbus Day: An American Farce proposes to end its journey seeking the perspective of the citizens of Italy and Spain after a group of Indigenous individuals land ashore discovering those countries in the name of Indigeneity!

RoundUP, NAISA, NAICA, FLAB MAG, Athens International Film + Video Festival, and Terrance Houle

As any day starts out this one has been no exception. The click of my dog's nails on the hardwood floors woke me from sleep. My dog likes to sneak in my bedroom and check to see if I'm awake. Sometimes, I greet him and welcome the day, other times I just cringe to know it's time to wake up. Thankfully, I knew a fresh pot of coffee was just minutes away from being brewed. That would definitely lessen the impact of an early rise on Sunday morning.

So the near future has been plaguing most of my waking minutes. The uncertainty of it mostly, and the somewhat seemingly directionless wandering of my days. I have the Native American Indigenous Studies Conference (NAISA) to attend in Tucson at the end of May, which I recently found out I was presented to NAISA as an affiliate of Native American Indigenous Cinema and Arts Organization (NAICA), which I am, but NAICA has somewhat shape-shifted into the more encompassing FLAB MAG and now I see my future assignment for FLAB being coverage of NAISA. Too much usage of acronyms in one paragraph, time to move on. Needless to say, I am excited for this opportunity.

At the end of April, I am fortunate to have been accepted into the 2010 Athens International Film and Video Festival, which is 37+ years old. This festival is in Athens, OH a sleepy, quaint, little town snug in the hills of south-central Ohio. It is also home to Ohio University. I am ecstatic to attend this festival, and to be honest, I usually don't get excited, but I am feeling a little excitement already. I normally reserve my excitement a couples days prior to an event. I have three short pieces in the festival: The Mechanics of Being NDN, The Ecstasy of Indigeneity Or the Passion of Billy Jack, and Technical Difficulties: a Fraud and a Fake. The last two pieces subvert famous "representations" on Un-Indians in American media, whereas the first piece comments on the objectified Native, literally. These three pieces originated from a past exhibit entitled, Round-Up, at the Urban Shaman Gallery in Winnipeg, MB Canada in October 2009. Round-Up is traveling to Santa Fe, NM August 1st, 2010 - January 1st, 2011 at the Museum of Contemporary Native Arts thanks to curator, Ryan Rice. I am already excited for this too.

Lately life has taken on the quiet hum of the mundane. Somewhere the routine infiltrated my life and pushed out creativity. It seems to have been a silent coup, no warning, no stirrings of unrest just the slow realization that something different is at the helm. Fortunately, friend and fellow artist, Terrance Houle has been able to talk me down from the ledges I find myself climbing, even as he himself has been enduring a change in his life. I am fortunate to have been asked to take part in one of his upcoming exhibits. In the fall, Terrance and I will be heading to Germany to collaborate on a video piece together and currently I am in pre-production on a feature length documentary that will utilize Terrance as the interviewer. Stay tuned.

Aimless - No GPS

Good-bye 2009, mundane and poisonous as you were. Hello 2010, thanks for starting off all jacked up without any clear indication of what you might be providing me in your first three months. This morning, I received notification from Ithaca College of my rejection for teaching in their film program, that makes three or four times now that I've literally applied for the same position and the third or fourth time that I've been rejected. Hmm? I know when I'm not wanted! Being that I only live a short drive away I thought I might be able to get my feet wet teaching in their program, but not even an adjunct bone has been tossed my way. This lone wolf is getting ravenous.

The beginning to this new decade is humming right along past me, as I practically lay prone in a defeated and beaten fetal position. Already? Jesus, it's a bit early for being beat down in 2010. I've gotta get my head above water and start treading like there's no tomorrow, tomorrow might just be as painful as today if things continue to go as capital as they have been last year and these past three months. I was looking forward to accomplishing a lot of things this year, but I feel so damned tired. Granted, daylight savings just ended and this time change has been taking somewhat of a toll on me, so maybe it's a temporary thing, it better be a temporary thing.

Although, I can say with the negative comes the positive, you can't have one charge without the other, can you? I don't think so. Some good has occurred within these past three months, which I believe balances out everything. Maybe I should look upon this as a fresh start? Like the board has been wiped clean. To be honest, I am a pessimist, that holds on to an ounce of optimism. Although that doesn't help me plod through all the muck and the mire.

I can say I've had the fortune of communicating with friend and fellow artist, TJ Houle and he's been helping me keep my outlook looking brighter than I have been able to illuminate it on my own. I am actually becoming the proud owner of one of his photographs, so my collection, small as it is, is slowly growing. We are planning on collaborating this year, and I am scraping and scrounging every cent to make sure it happens. I am also planning on meeting up with him in his travels to Toronto and NYC, which will be a grand meeting of the minds.

Ideas come and go, some get written down others are simply so fleeting there isn't even time to grab a pen and paper to catch them before they get lost in the ether. Lately, I feel like I have misplaced my pen and paper as I struggle to even piece together the ideas I have to make them coherent, but I also struggle to get the words out to enable myself to speak at times.

If it weren't for FLAB MAG, friend's Maria and TJ I think I'd become complacent in the position I am in, but I am warring to get out. I am hoping for great things and rearing my ugly head as hard as I can to make things happen, only time will tell if they will. There is hope, even without a GPS.

Googlebating, no self-deprecation here

Well thank you TJ! Now that you've educated me on googlebating, somehow after 39 years, I missed out on using that verbage for a significant period of time. A coworker was reading my earlier blog, Terrance KINDOFABIGDEAL Houle and inquired as to what exactly googlebating is/was, so I stood there looking over their shoulder, peering while they themselves googlebated. I'm not quite sure what the requisite etiquette is when one is in the presence of someone googlebating, but I didn't look away. Actually, I couldn't help but not avert my eyes as they performed this force majeure. It was like passing a car accident and not being able to look away from the aftermath of twisted metal, gnarled flesh, and blood-soaked asphalt. At this moment I became a spectator, a voyeur, witnessing a feverish symphony of self-discovery; all the more drawn in by the sheer visceral frenzy transpiring in front of me.

Eventually another coworker walked by as we were discussing googlebating and my friend inquired of them if they googlebated, a confused, somewhat guilty look appeared on their face. The guilty party questioned us as to what that meant, and we prodded a bit further, "What do you think it means." Their reply was, "When you google someone." As we corrected them, they countered, "No, not really." To wit, they have, in the past, but they haven't done so recently . . . or at least they aren't telling.

All the while a fellow coworker sitting near our conversation was in semi-hysterics over the discussion being had, making that particular party guilty of knowing and googlebating themselves.

So, my advice is to find someone you know of an older persuasion and inquire of them if they googlebate. Do it with the straightest face you can muster, preferably to someone that isn't so Internet savvy, maybe a parent or better yet, a grandparent. And, make it a practice to googlebate once a week at the least. Googlebating, it's good for you!

Terrance KINDOFABIGDEAL Houle

Okay, this is really only me promoting my friend and fellow interdisciplinary media artist, Terrance TJ Houle, from the Blood Tribe in Canada, to learn more about him here is his site: terrancehoule.com, or you can just google him, go ahead he won't mind, actually he likes to be googled, he thinks it's dirty!

He also googlebates (TJ's word not mine—oh but you know I'm gonna use it), who of us doesn't? I googlebated earlier at work, and no one is the wiser. It's so fulfilling, and satisfying, I just might do it again, but I better clear my history so it's a clean go 'round. I actually found that poorly written bad review by googlebating, the first post here, the Sandee Moore, self-proclaimed, "Inter-Media Artist." She eats gingerbread houses that are "human-sized" and calls it a performance . . . please it took her six days to eat it and it was 1/4 "human-size." I could eat it in two days, now that's a performance. TJ wants to know what an "Inter-Media" artist is, as do I. She must make tons of bank working in tv, radio, cinema, internet, print, et cetera, as an "Inter-Media" artist—she really means multi-media, but prefers to use the anachronistic term, which really didn't see a rise in usage, academically or otherwise. Go ahead, google it. I'll wait for you.

I digressed. Okay, so if you're in the Calgary area 01.09.10, check this out:

The High Performance Rodeo presents
Grandstand Night 3
Matt Masters with Terrance Houle

Monsters, aliens, cowboys and . . . indie bands? For the third consecutive year, the Rodeo rocks to the tune of Grandstand, where Calgary’s hottest musicians team with visual artists to create an unforgettable collage of sound and film. This time ‘round, they pay tribute to the movie magic of cult films, bringing life to the silver screen by mixing film clips and soundtracks with original music in a genre-tastic re-imagination of cinematic classics.

So, I have been trying to solicit TJ's wonderfully humorous and satirical assistance in a feature length documentary, but funding opportunities are turning up dry, another rejection from the All Roads Film Project which if I had received funding from them it would have covered travel costs bringing the internationally known TJ to the US for us to collaborate on the documentary, he with his witty and cutting skills as a performance artist conducting interviews and me with my cinematography, directing and editing prowess. Now we are hoping to be able to collaborate on this documentary if funding, somehow, "rears it's head."

Fortunately, we have the ability to instance message one another on occasion, that's of course when he isn't busy creating work and I'm not bogged down in the drudgery of my "digital media specialist" position at my grown-up job. Although that job has afforded me the opportunity to earn bank so I can travel on occasion, not to mention the editing suite I maintain and the tools therein.

So, why am I babbling you might ask? Terrance and I are coming to a town near you, we are about to blowup and spread the theatrics of Indigeneity upon all who are near, or at least one of us will. Well, for the most part that's Terrance. He's been a great friend encouraging me to seek funding and residencies, and encouraging me to visit Germany . . . 2010 look out.

Just check out Terrance's work and watch out for him, I hear he likes to punch the moose knuckle when people wear spandex, so all you spandex clad fools better be faster than TJ, otherwise, POW, he'll sock you one right in the moose knuckle.