WNDX Turns Five!


* Photos from WNDX 2006

For those us around since the very beginning - Solomon Nagler and myself - it's actually been six years in the making. Along with the two other festival founders, Walter Forsberg and Carole O'Brien, we believed that it was absolutely imperative that a festival like WNDX come to exist in Winnipeg.

Film festivals introduce new works to the greater community, giving attention to films and filmmakers that might otherwise go unnoticed. For WNDX, our priority from day one has been to provide attention to independent and experimental works. These are the works for which Winnipeg is nationally and internationally recognized, and yet there had never been a festival in Winnipeg which provided them with a serious home before WNDX. As a result, the work of many Winnipeg filmmakers - expecially those filmmakers who emerged in the 1990's and 2000's - had simply gone unnoticed here at home, waiting for screenings in other provinces and countries to provide them with recognition and acclaim.

Aside from the original four founders, WNDX has been propelled by the support of a few other key individuals: Jaimz Asmundson, who joined our programming collective just before our first festival; Alex Rogalski, who also eagerly jumped on the WNDX ride just before the first festival, calmly resolving grave technical problems our very first year so the One Take Super 8 Event show could go on; Leslie Stafford, who helped introduce WNDX to the broader Winnipeg community, which had never quite seen a festival like ours before; and the staff of the Winnipeg Film Group, who from year one have gone out of their way to support the festival on a largerly voluntary basis.

WNDX also owes a debt of gratitute to the Canada Council for the Arts, for its vital support of our festival from the very beginning.

Five years ago, I billetted Alexandre Larose, a Quebec filmmaker, at my house for his first trip to WNDX. For him, WNDX stayed true to the filmmaking identity for which Winnipeg is known in other provinces and internationally - a place where innovation and new approaches will always have a home. A full circle is drawn in year five, as in 2010 Larose becomes the first recipient of the newly created WNDX jury prize for Best Canadian Work, for his film VILLE MARIE.

Unlike the anonymous nature of some of the festivals in larger centres, WNDX is a very personal experience. Even as our audiences numbers and out of town guests increase each year, we strive to keep WNDX an experience where everybody can connect intimately with the idea of innovation in moving image art.

We hope you enjoy our festival.

Cecilia Araneda
WNDX President & Co-Founder