Survivalist Cinema

Solar-powered micro-cinema

Survivalist Cinema is a solar-powered micro-cinema fashioned after a wilderness lean-to — a stand-in for the outmoded drive-in theater, whose wooden screen structure can be repurposed as material for the lean-to in future iterations. The screen that once reflected light now absorbs it, through a solar panel and DIY mobile battery apparatus. Cinema as collective experience is recast as isolation, or waystation.

The cinema has screened environmental dystopia and survivalist films from the 1970s, and has served as a venue for curated programs including Anthroposcenic (2015), featuring work by five artists, and STREAM 3 (2016), with moving image work by three artists. STREAM takes place in South Windham, VT.

2007-2017
Wood, branches, solar panel and portable battery, video

With special thanks to Dave Bonta of Sunnyside Solar.

View the Survivalist Cinema trailers | About the Stream exhibitions

Watching Idaho Transfer, a 1973 science fiction film directed by Peter Fonda
concept sketch