Not For Tourists is an alternative guide to New York City's contemporary art scene. In each <H>ART-edition, NY-based curator Niels Van Tomme highlights a non-profit cultural organization. Ranging from the well established to the marginal, from the intellectual to the politically engaged, Not For Tourists leads through the artistic heart of the Big Apple. This episode offers an interview with Thomas Beard, co-founder of the Brooklyn venue Light Industry.

Why did you decide to start Light Industry in the already heavily saturated cultural scene of New York City?
Thomas Beard: "I began Light Industry in the spring of 2008 with Ed Halter. At that time, alternative cinema spaces like the Robert Beck Memorial Cinema and Ocularis, which I'd overseen in its last years, had come to a close. Light Industry was founded, in part, as an effort to fill that particular void in New York film culture."

Which organizations were inspirations for Light Industry? Were there any historical collectives, or non-profits that you took as your model?
Beard: "The strong tradition of alternative art spaces in New York has been a definitive influence. Equally inspiring is the history of cinematheques and other intrepid film exhibitors that the city has been host to: Amos and Marcia Vogel's seminal film society Cinema 16 in the 40s and 50s, Jonas Mekas and the Filmmakers's Cinematheque in the 60s, The Collective for Living Cinema in the 70s and 80s, and the microcinemas of the 90s and 00s."

You've hosted a significant number of diverse events, ranging from traditionally curated film screenings by recognized experimental film experts to wild performances like, for example, Cory Arcangel's ‘Bruce Springsteen Born to Run Glockenspiel Addendum'. Are there any specific characteristics that you have in mind when you plan an event?
Beard: "One of Light Industry's main goals is to foster a dialog amongst a wide range of artists and audiences in the city. New York is home to number of fertile, but somewhat fragmented creative communities. For instance, you have audiences for experimental film, new media art, adventurous international narrative cinema, and the art world more broadly, yet it's remarkable how rarely these scenes overlap. What we've tried to do, then, is present a series of events, each organized by different invited artists, critics, or curators, who represent a wide range of interests and perspectives, to bring them together under one roof. That way, someone who came to Light Industry because they were interested in, say, Cory's work, might end up checking out a Straub-Huillet movie that they wouldn't have otherwise come across. That's the hope, anyway!"

Unusual in programming and loose in structure and set-up, there is a certain comfort coming from the familiar way in which you stage most of your events. The placing of chairs, for example, is always done in a very nice and orderly way. What kind of relationship are you trying to establish with your audience during these events?
Beard: "Well, the idea of the cinema as a social space is very important to us. What we're trying to create with the audience is a shared experience, a shared commitment to a given event. Everyone schleps across town to Light Industry, to this industrial complex in Brooklyn, sits in the dark for two hours, and then thinks and talks seriously about what they've just seen. That's rather reductive, of course, but you get the idea. The experience of film and video so often in galleries or museums is one of wandering in and out for a few minutes. Slapping something on a DVD and looping it in a room isn't exactly a rigorous enterprise, but unfortunately it's a de facto curatorial mode. Cinema deserves better; we all do. So we strive to give the people who come to Light Industry a program that has political backbone, a lacerating intelligence, and feels like a party. We're all in it together."

What is according to you the most exciting trend in New York City at the moment?
Beard: "Well, we're about to relocate to a 5,000-square-foot storefront in downtown Brooklyn that's been donated to us by a consortium of building owners in the area that are literally giving away incredible spaces (albeit temporarily) to arts organizations so that the neighborhood doesn't look shuttered up as a result of the economic downturn. So that's exciting to me: a neighborhood where previously you only went to serve jury duty or buy sneakers might soon be one of the most culturally vibrant places in the city."

What are your plans with Light Industry for the near future?
Beard: "The new space I just mentioned is the biggest news. We're actually sharing it with two other fantastic groups: Triple Canopy and The Public School. Our respective projects are quite different, but I'm confident that we'll be able to work together in the space, share resources, and keep the venue's calendar full of great screenings, readings, performances, and classes almost every night of the week."

Niels VAN TOMME

www.lightindustry.org