Cinema Arts Festival Houston 2009

Description: The artistic director of H BOX, an innovative, mobile screening room presenting work by ten international artists, talks about commissioning original works of art and exhibiting them in this exciting new venue, on display in the Alabama Theater through November 15.

Benjamin Weil, the artistic director of H BOX, was the executive director of Artists Space in New York and currently Chief Curator of the LABoral Art and Industrial Creation Centre in Spain. The H BOX project, produced by the fashion house Hermes, was first unveiled in 2007 at the Pompidou Center in Paris and has been exhibited at the Tate Modern in London and art museums in Europe and Asia.

Toby Kamps, senior curator at the Contemporary Arts Museum, has organized solo exhibitions by artists such as Claes Oldenburg, Ellsworth Kelly, Vanessa Beecroft, and Martin Kersels. A graduate of the Williams College Graduate Program, he has written extensively on contemporary art and artists for exhibition catalogues and magazines.

Mary Magsamen is the curator at the Aurora Picture Show. She is a video artist who often collaborates with her husband, Stephan Hillerbrand. Their work, solo and together, has been exhibited internationally at museums, art galleries, and at many festivals including LA Freewaves and the Ann Arbor Film Festival.