Programmed by Amy kazymerchyk
Bill Daniel in Person

Who is Bozo Texino? chronicles the search for the source of a ubiquitous and mythic rail graffiti- a simple sketch of a character with an infinity-shaped hat and the scrawled moniker, “Bozo Texino”-- a drawing seen on railcars for over 80 years. Daniel’s gritty black and white film uncovers a secret society and it’s underground universe of hobo and railworker graffiti, and includes interviews with legendary boxcar artists, Coaltrain, Herby, Colossus of Roads, and The Rambler.  Shooting over a 16-year period, Daniel rode freights across the West carrying a Super-8 sound camera and a 16mm Bolex. During his quest he discovered the roots of a folkloric tradition that has gone mostly unnoticed for a century. Taking inspiration from Beat artists Robert Frank and Jack Kerouac, the film functions as both a sub-cultural documentary and a stylized fable on wanderlust and outsider identity. “I was drawn to the subject by the universal graffiti impulse and the classic, corny notion of freight train blues escape.” – BD www.billdaniel.net

Friday September 5 2008 5-6pm
Book Launch of Mostly True by Bill Daniel
Spartacus Books 684 E. Hastings St.
www.spartacusbooks.org

A rollicking rail zine of freight riding stories, interviews with hoboes and boxcar artists, historical oddities and tons of photos of modern day boxcar tags- known as monikers- the result of a 25year obsession with hobo and railworker folklore presented in the guise of a vintage railroad fanzine.

Friday September 5 2008 8pm
Sunset Scavenger
Maclean Park - 700 block E.Georgia

Sunset Scavenger is an outdoor video installation based on ideas concerning the end of the oil age. It is a collage essay on ecological catastrophe, sustainability, improvisation and self-reliance, featuring hippie houseboaters, punk back-to-the-landers, rubber tramps, off-the-gridders, and desert rats, who are today’s true cultural vanguard. The two-screen video program is projected on the sails of the Sailvan, a 1984 Ford veggie oil-converted diesel van with a 2-masted gaff-rigged schooner that functions as tour vehicle, projection screen and metaphorical emergency escape craft.