Hasta La Ideas

LA gets Levi’s third creative production popup

by Mark Buche

Los Angeles is to filmmaking what New York is to photography and San Francisco is to screen-printing, so it makes sense that the third installment of the Levi’s Workshop—opening this weekend at MoCA’s Geffen Contemporary—focuses on L.A.’s native art form. Levi’s Film Workshop makes professional resources like edit rooms, equipment rentals—including high-end cameras like the Red One—and training available to the public free of charge.

Like the Photo Workshop that took up residence in NYC during October last year, the Film Workshop is Levi’s democratic approach to arming people with a slew of valuable resources that are oft-inaccessible to the average creative individual.

Inside a glass display houses a huge array of vintage and modern cameras available for rent. Behind that are shelves neatly sorted with sound equipment from RØDE, grip and light gear from Quixote, tripods and accessories from Manfrotto. Once you’ve finished shooting your project, with that equipment and using the in-house edit suite to make a completed film there’s also a screening room in which you can showcase your work.

Educational workshops led by various collaborators and non-profits will teach everything from the basics of shooting on Super 8 to reworking and looping found film to using the latest digital camera equipment.

To accompany the workshop Levi’s is releasing a series of Art in the Streets Trucker Jackets created by collaborating artists like Shepard Fairey, Chaz Bojorquez, Crash and Lady Pink. Each of the 10 jackets is limited to 50 units per-artist and will retail for $250 with proceeds benefiting the MoCA.

Levi’s Film Workshop opens to the public 17 April 2011 and runs through 8 August 2011 during regular museum hours.