Filmmaker

Film/Video Consulting Projects

Produced video “Learning without Walls” as consultant on City of Rochester project “Rochester Stories” for the School without Walls (2010).

Postproduction consultant, (2009, 2012), “The Last Experiment,” a social documentary that grapples with how one community deals with the challenges of global climate change.

Honorable Mention, Smoky Mountain Nantahala Media Festival, 1997 and 1999 for “The Road Home” and “Home Sweet Home”, which was honored at the Lily Guernesey International Film and Video Festival 2000 along with “How does your Garden Grow?” in 2003. For complete screening list see my filmography.

Video Residency, Experimental Television Center, Ltd., Owego, NY, 1997.

Received French government and NYS Regional Arts Council grants and co-distribution (1999-2001, 2007, 2008, and 2012).

Conceived, shot and produced “Perry in His Garden” shown at the International Film Market, Cannes and the Cinema du Reel in Paris, France.

Programmed films and panels for Matrilineage Film Festival, for Upstate Media, funded by the NYS Council of the Arts, 2002 and multiple documentary and ethnographic film festivals in Paris, France.

Additional Experience

  • Director/Editor at Syracuse University Summer Sessions.
  • Video Production Trainer for Buffalo Cable Access Media, Buffalo, NY.
  • Freelance Video Editor for United Nations Development Program.
  • Video Technician for WTN News/ABC, New York, NY.

Filmography

FRANCE (1982-1987)
  • When Smoke Gets in your
  • Eyes
  • Close Shave
  • Perry in his Garden (co-distributed and produced with the French Foreign Ministry and the CNRS, Center for French Scientific Research)
  • Egg Yolk
  • The Four Seasons
UNITED STATES (1988-present)
  • Maid of the Mist
  • The Cookie Queen
  • Thanatos
  • How does your Garden Grow?
  • Home Sweet Home
  • The Road Home
  • The Waiting Game
  • In My Mother’s House
  • Attached
  • Can’t Sleep
CURRENT PRODUCTIONS:
  • Preproduction: Moving Day, Dwelling in Displacement
  • Client based video work: UNDP, Bristol-Myers Squibb, WTN and BCAM (see resume)
  • DVD training videos: Qigong with Wendy
  • Artist book productions: Lost (4 versions), Attached (2 versions)
AWARDS AND FESTIVALS:

DOCUMENTARIES

  • How Does Your Garden Grow?
    • AWARDS: Highly Commended – The Guernsey Lily Film and Video Festival
    • FESTIVALS/SCREENINGS: 2003 – The Guernsey Lily Film and Video Festival, England 1998 – Buffalo Movie Video Makers, Buffalo, N.Y. 1993 – Visible Women (Squeaky Wheel),Buffalo, N.Y. 1991 – Regional Rewind, Rochester, N.Y.
  • Home Sweet Home
    • AWARDS: Honorable Mention, Documentary Category – Natahala Media Festival Highly Commended, Documentary Category – Lily Guernsey International Film and Video Festival
    • FESTIVALS/SCREENINGS: 2000 – Lily Guernsey International Film and Video Festival 1999 – DUTV cable 54 Jan/Feb, Community cultural educational television,Philadelphia 1998 – Smoky Mountain/Nantahala Media Festival, N.C. 1997 – Lockport Community Television “New Directions in Video” Lockport public access cable channel 20 1997 – Buffalo Movie Video Makers, Buffalo, N.Y. 1996 – NAMAC (National Alliance for Media Arts and Culture), Oakland, CA. 1993 – Upstate Media Regrant, Visual Studies Workshop, Rochester, N.Y.
  • Perry in His Garden
    • AWARDS: Official Selection – Cannes Film Market Official Selection – Festival des Femme
    • FESTIVALS/SCREENINGS: 2001 – Visual Studies Workshop, “No-TV” Series, Rochester, N.Y. 1988 – Crandall Library, Glens Falls, N.Y. 1988 – Visual Studies Workshop, Rochester, N.Y. 1988 – Little Theatre, Documentary Festival, Rochester, N.Y. 1986 – Marche International du Film, Cannes, France 1986 – Festival des Femmes, Paris, France 1986 – Cinema du Reel, Paris, France

EXPERIMENTAL

  • Attached
    • FESTIVALS/SCREENINGS: 2012 – San Gio’ Video Festival
  • The Road Home
    • AWARDS: Honorable Mention, Experimental Category – Smoky Mountain/Nantahala Media Festival
    • FESTIVALS/SCREENINGS: 1998 – Brooklyn Film Festival, Brooklyn, N.Y. 1997 – Visual Studies Workshop, guest speaker and screening 1997 – Smoky Mountain/Nantahala Media Festival, N.C. 1997 – Society for Photographic Education-National Conference (Women’s Caucus), Rochester, N.Y.

NARRATIVE

Quick Links to Movies

Attached
Attached is an experimental video poem based on haiku. Haiku is a short poem, written in less than 17 syllables, usually in three lines and often with a seasonal reference. This twelve minute video uses the visual element as a complement, juxtaposition or addition rather than illustration of the haiku. 

How Does Your Garden Grow?
Perry Nichols, an 84 year old retired engineer, now spends most of his time cultivating his garden. He gives away two-thirds of his crop to neighbors and family. To his family, he is a frugal, reclusive, conservative old man, whereas to his neighbors, he stands out as a Vermonter – active, independent, and willing to help. To himself, he is a man for whom work is a vital necessity. He is a busy man in what he sees as the best of worlds possible. 

Can’t Sleep
Can’t Sleep is a four minute silent narrative group project in which Wendy Smith worked primarily on lighting and camera. This was scripted, shot and edited in two days at Maine Media Workshops using a RED EPIC camera.

Artist's Statement

In many of my films, I explore the subject of exile and home, examining how new technologies and culture intersect around questions of identity and emigration.

This interests me personally because I was an ex-patriot, living in France for 14 years.  My anthropology background has given me insight into this phenomenon as people become displaced around the world because of economics and war.

After producing two videos on this subject matter, I am currently doing pre-production work on cross- cultural representation and transnational identity for the experimental documentary, Dwelling in Displacement, dealing with how political exiles and ex-patriots cope with displacement and loss of homeland.  To this end, I applied for a short-term visitor grant at the Smithsonian Institute, as well as French funding, since the majority of the filming will take place in Paris. This piece, Dwelling in Displacement, will be Part III of my trilogy on memory, identity and home, begun with Home Sweet Home and The Road Home.

In addition, I am interested in looking at concrete ways that animation and installation can be integrated with film/video to explore the boundaries of those mediums, such as:

  • My most recent video for the web, Attached, combines the art form of poetry, video and music as a collaborative project between poet, videographer and musician.
  • The Attached collaboration has led me to work with a local sculpture artist on an installation we will produce using footage from this video, integrating material objects and images.
  • Currently in production, Moving Day is an animated narrative based on a short story I wrote, which has received partial funding.
  • Previous collaborative work while in France involved dance and film, as I particularly enjoy the synergy of integrating multiple mediums and artists.

Although my primary writing interests are in film/video criticism (see my film reviews), previous publications have treated the documentary in intercultural contexts as well as issues in anthropology, education and science.