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"   Photo: Courtesy of Molly Surno  When artist Molly Surno moved to New York City from Los Angeles, she was in search of an avant-garde film community. She never found it\u2014so she created one herself, dubbing it Cinema 16, in honor of the 1940s film society of the same name. Cinema 16&amp;#039;s one-off screenings pair silent films with music by live bands, fusing notions of space, performance, sound, and\u2014yes\u2014community. In anticipation of Cinema 16&amp;#039;s final event of 2010 (which takes place December 3 at Attic Studios in Long Island City), ELLE spoke to Surno about the state of experimental film and the problem with YouTube. ELLE: What led you to launch Cinema 16 in 2008?Molly: Los Angeles has a plethora of incredible places where you can experience the magic of cinema, [and] when I came to New York I was surprised that there wasn&amp;#039;t the glamorizing that I&amp;#039;d heard in Patti Smith songs, or whatever. When I came to New York I was really searching for community and one thing I noticed was there was a wealth of creative and outstanding talented individuals, but didn&amp;#039;t think there was the space that allowed us to interact, not in a guest list way, but in a holistic pure form of experiencing art together \u2014 and that was the impetus for Cinema 16. ELLE: Has the format changed much?Molly: The first one I had almost 400 people there. So it&amp;#039;s funny, the evolution hasn&amp;#039;t been in terms of interest, because the program has consistently seen so many people, so many bands, so many films. I think the evolution of it is more the breadth of the places I&amp;#039;ve been able to work with. I&amp;#039;m starting to travel with the program\u2014I&amp;#039;ve gone to L.A., and [there are] potentially some international shows coming up. ELLE: What&amp;#039;s been the biggest surprise?Molly: It&amp;#039;s such a simple idea in many ways; combining music with film has existed since film started. What&amp;#039;s revolutionary is the way that it&amp;#039;s done and the amount of time put into it. I&amp;#039;m consistently surprised by how much people will work to make it happen, what time and energy bands will put into it. When executed with such precision and love and done right, it&amp;#039;s become such a spectacular event, such a spectacular art opening. An incidental surprise was when an original member of Cinema 16 arrived last April\u2014he participated in the initial film society of the `40s and `50s. He was incredibly supportive and really interested and intrigued by this incarnation...that was pretty cool! ELLE: What would you say is the major difference between what you&amp;#039;re doing and what the original Cinema 16 did?Molly: The motive behind it is the same, the way it&amp;#039;s being presented is very different. Both have this idea that you need to come together to experience experimental films or films you can&amp;#039;t see in other venues. The difference was that there weren&amp;#039;t that many spaces executing these programs [in the `40s]. In my case, everything is accessible; you can watch it on YouTube, but it&amp;#039;s not the best way to experience these experimental masterpieces. I&amp;#039;m battling the solitude of technology. ELLE: So do you consider Cinema 16 performance art or a film screening?Molly: Very much as an art experience. I never call it a film screening, because it&amp;#039;s transcendent in a lot of ways. The idea is you can go to see a film at 3:30, 5:30, 7:30, [whereas] this is a one night event, it&amp;#039;s a singular, unique experience. If you miss this night, you miss an experience. It can&amp;#039;t be replicated, it can&amp;#039;t be downloaded. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.elle.com/culture/movies-tv/news/a5306/girl-on-film-molly-surno-makes-movie-magic-cinema-16-10804/>