MUSEUM SHOW: "hit" cat videos, with commercial deals - would love to see this for mother's day!!
"... put up a giant movie screen on the lawn for one night and play popular cat videos from the Internet? Visitors would submit their favorite clips and a panel, including Stulen, other curators and outside artists, would pick the best ones based on artistic merit.
“We thought maybe a couple of dozen people would show up,” Stulen recalled. “I mean, we are talking about cat videos.”
But their estimates were way off. On a Thursday night just before Labor Day weekend, an estimated 10,000 people turned out to see a 70-minute reel of videos of cats acting cute, behaving badly or just simply doing nothing at all—clips that had been seen on YouTube many times before.
At least 1,000 more people had been turned away because of lack of space. According to Stulen, so many turned out that exits from a nearby highway were clogged and local police had to divert traffic from the museum."
This Saturday, it will screen on the Great Wall of Oakland, the side of a 10-story building where, since 2006, large-scale projections of video art and film have been shown. Already, organizers are predicting more than 5,000 people will turn out for the festival, where proceeds from the $10 admission cost will benefit a Bay Area animal shelter.
The latest incarnation of the festival comes as cat videos seem to be more popular than ever, racking up tens of millions of views on YouTube and other sites. The videos have transformed some random felines—and their owners—into overnight celebrities, complete with pricey endorsement deals and book contracts.
One of the most successful so far is Will Braden, a Seattle filmmaker who shot a two-minute video of Henry, a fluffy tuxedo cat owned by his family, for his film class seven years ago. In his video, Henry was transformed into Henri Le Chat Noir, a French cat deep in existential crisis.
Filmed in black and white, the clip shows Henri lounging around the house, his thoughts spoken by a narrator with a French accent, as he complains about his mundane existence.
“I live a life of luxury,” Henri declares. “But I feel empty.”
Braden uploaded the film to YouTube for his friends and family to see. But soon, it had more than 1 million clicks. A follow-up film, “Henri, Paw de Deux,” was even more popular—featuring Henri lamenting about a life where he sleeps 15 hours a day and is “surrounded by morons.” The clip, which has been viewed more than 7 million times, helped land Braden a book deal. And last summer, it earned a “Golden Kitty,” the Walker Art Center’s cat video equivalent of an Oscar. That led to an endorsement deal with Friskies, which paid Braden to make several Henri films about cat food.
...cats are, for the most part, in the home and their owners don’t really interact with each other,” Stulen said. “But exchanging cat videos online has become the cat park.”
He suspects that’s why the cat video festival has been so popular—it’s a rare opportunity for cat people to interact with each other and laugh at their pets.
“It’s one thing to watch cat videos at home and quite another to do it surrounded by thousands of other people,” he said. “It’s just laughter and joy.”
by: holly bailey
would love to do this for mother's day. lol. too bad its not showing around here.
“We thought maybe a couple of dozen people would show up,” Stulen recalled. “I mean, we are talking about cat videos.”
But their estimates were way off. On a Thursday night just before Labor Day weekend, an estimated 10,000 people turned out to see a 70-minute reel of videos of cats acting cute, behaving badly or just simply doing nothing at all—clips that had been seen on YouTube many times before.
At least 1,000 more people had been turned away because of lack of space. According to Stulen, so many turned out that exits from a nearby highway were clogged and local police had to divert traffic from the museum."
This Saturday, it will screen on the Great Wall of Oakland, the side of a 10-story building where, since 2006, large-scale projections of video art and film have been shown. Already, organizers are predicting more than 5,000 people will turn out for the festival, where proceeds from the $10 admission cost will benefit a Bay Area animal shelter.
The latest incarnation of the festival comes as cat videos seem to be more popular than ever, racking up tens of millions of views on YouTube and other sites. The videos have transformed some random felines—and their owners—into overnight celebrities, complete with pricey endorsement deals and book contracts.
One of the most successful so far is Will Braden, a Seattle filmmaker who shot a two-minute video of Henry, a fluffy tuxedo cat owned by his family, for his film class seven years ago. In his video, Henry was transformed into Henri Le Chat Noir, a French cat deep in existential crisis.
Filmed in black and white, the clip shows Henri lounging around the house, his thoughts spoken by a narrator with a French accent, as he complains about his mundane existence.
“I live a life of luxury,” Henri declares. “But I feel empty.”
Braden uploaded the film to YouTube for his friends and family to see. But soon, it had more than 1 million clicks. A follow-up film, “Henri, Paw de Deux,” was even more popular—featuring Henri lamenting about a life where he sleeps 15 hours a day and is “surrounded by morons.” The clip, which has been viewed more than 7 million times, helped land Braden a book deal. And last summer, it earned a “Golden Kitty,” the Walker Art Center’s cat video equivalent of an Oscar. That led to an endorsement deal with Friskies, which paid Braden to make several Henri films about cat food.
...cats are, for the most part, in the home and their owners don’t really interact with each other,” Stulen said. “But exchanging cat videos online has become the cat park.”
He suspects that’s why the cat video festival has been so popular—it’s a rare opportunity for cat people to interact with each other and laugh at their pets.
“It’s one thing to watch cat videos at home and quite another to do it surrounded by thousands of other people,” he said. “It’s just laughter and joy.”
by: holly bailey
would love to do this for mother's day. lol. too bad its not showing around here.
Replies
That is sooo funny. I usually don\'t go to the Cat videos at home.
So sorry that Henri feel\'s soo empty. He need\'s a new agent.
did you watch it? i think the \"character\" of henri, is supposed to be that of a \"spoiled\" ergo \"empty and void of real depth and feeling\" cat. so funny. cats are so humanlike. glad you liked it. xxoo
This story cracks me up! I can totally believe it, though! LOL! *HUGS*