Wednesday, August 4, 2010

A Factory grows in the Bronx, the art of Factory B and the influence of Robert Dume


- Robert Dume by LaGata

The Bronx is due for its own renaissance. At the head of the movement is a team of artist, directors, photographers and musicians together they are drawn together by the Factory B showcase. One of the people behind Factory B is Robert Dume, this is his side of the story on Factory B.


After our walk around I sit down with Robert to get some information about the formation of the show, his views on the Bronx and the Factory B collective.

So tell me Robert whats up?

"Not much I just invited you to come out because I wanted you to check out the space. I wanted to get some people to recognize whats happening with the Factory B Showcases, I know there are people that are seeing it on facebook...people are talking about it in certain galleries. Its very small, very humble but where hoping that it becomes bigger than what it is now.

"We have another show coming up august 7th we have another opening focused on portraits and Poetry we have a bunch of really amazing artist coming out guys like Joey and Adrian and ___ poets like __. Its going to be a lot of talent. " In the other room which is our photography gallery theres going to be a bunch of super super amazing photographer and theres one piece that I think is gonna blow people away...I'm not going to give anything away about it." It seems like a promising prospect due to the works I've just witnessed.

How Factory B started and the art movenement in the South Bronx

"We started after we did my first short film, when we filmed we filmed in the second room," pointing towards the Photography gallery space, "we used it, borrowed it, whatever and the manager was like "you guys should come back and screen" and we were like "ok cool we'll come back screen it" and then one of our business partners Dave he goes "you should put up some of Louisa's photography," she was our set photographer, and also my girlfriend (she still is) and one of our partners he was like "we should put it up in the second room just put some of the behind scene stuff of the film" I was like alright that's cool and then we started thinking and we started realizing maybe we wanted to do something bigger - something different...we ended up with lets [the idea of lets] put together an art show where we'll showcase a bunch of films plus films of people that we know and other independent film makers. So it ended up becoming this big showcase where we had 7 different film makers a couple trailers and about 11 artist and I believe 6 photographers the numbers maybe off right now I maybe a little fuzzy on that."

We laughed if off as I move into my next question, "Tell me about the energy of these shows? Like were in the south Bronx right now so there is a lot of stuff going on right now tell me about that tell me about how you feel about whats happening to the south Bronx?"

"I think The South Bronx is kind of what Williamsburg was 10 years ago it still very much industrial but there are a lot of people that are slowly starting to migrate north. I think the Bronx has been predominately Latino and Black for a long time but suddenly were seeing white people Chinese people any and every color of people are all of a sudden coming up. So we look at this as trying to jump ahead of the curve and establishing a movement and a scene in a place that was kind of barren for a while and a lot of people have said, that I've spoken, they we really adamant about how much they dug what we were doing because it fresh faces, new blood into a scene and trying to establish something that is a little more our own. We feel so much of the art is coming out of either the LES or Chealsea or Brooklyn and that's what were geared to and that what we understand and that's it, and we just kind of wanted to get away from that saturation.

So we look at it like inevitability you people are going to end up moving up here its going to become the kind of place that Williamsburg is in that its hip and cool but there is also a a lot of people living there - people want there own space eventually their going to go you know I cant pay rent here and I got to move somewhere else where is there something cool going on and we want it to be here.

I think a lot of people are afraid of the idea of being in the Bronx I think the Bronx has a really bad reputation of a long time. I think a lot of people are not over what the Bronx use to be in the 70s' you know. I think that the thing that drives me and my team to do what where doing because so many people are so afraid of coming up here. You know I go and talk to people about "we're putting on this art show , we're putting together all these great artist, we have a dope showcase...great energy great vibe", [who ever Robert would talk to would say to the effect] "awesome I'll come through where is it", "the Bronx', Robert makes a hissing noise as he pulls away mocking the reaction the person he was talking to "yeah you now I think i'll pass.""

To Robert the idea of being confined by your neighborhood and scene that going on around you is beacause "that's what you been told", he adds in that if based on influence "maybe If I told you the Bronx was cool eventually you'll listen to me too."

"Everybody who came into our show where amazingly positive, people where hugging one another, there where people who would never spoken to one another on any other bases" The back ground of people who attended the first show were as varying as the art itself."

The People behind Factory B

- The Briefcase Productions team
"Its organized by briefcase productions, that I'm apart of, its a small production company. We do music video's, short film's, we're working on a documentary The Electro Wars I know some people may have heard about it some people may have not..."Looking at my recording devide "get out from the rock your sleeping or living under, google The Electro Wars and then get back to me," he sits back in his chair taking a reprieve from his jest, but makes a good point this film has been getting some notice and should be checked upon.


Robert regards the team as friends who've know each other for a while "its myself, my girl-friend Louisa Garcia aka LaGata Photography, David Dias, Tara Evans, and Matt Raymo" The initial project's that drew them together as production team was a film by David and . It got chosen to be on Reel Thirteen's Film corner and got to air nation wide. At that point Robert began to script a film and to work with the duo along with Louisa and inevitably it turned into briefcase productions." I guess this is where you can say the rest is history. The next Factory B show opening will be August 7th get the info here.

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