Sundance's New Frontier
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| Sundance's New Frontier | |
|---|---|
| Name | New Frontier |
| Location | Park City, Utah |
| Established | 2007 |
| Founder | Sundance Institute |
| Website | sundance.org |
Sundance's New Frontier
New Frontier is a multidisciplinary program of the Sundance Institute that foregrounds experimental film, interactive media, virtual reality, performance art, and immersive storytelling, linking avant-garde practice to mainstream platforms through exhibitions and screenings. Originating in the Sundance Film Festival ecosystem, New Frontier has intersected with institutions, artists, galleries, technology companies, and arts funders to expand the boundaries of narrative and exhibition across Park City, Los Angeles, New York, and international venues.
History
New Frontier emerged from the Sundance Institute's broader mission begun by Robert Redford and coalesced amid shifts in media after the digital film revolutions of the 1990s and 2000s involving entities like Pixar, Apple Inc., Warner Bros., Netflix, and HBO. Early iterations built on experimental precedents set by Andy Warhol, Stan Brakhage, Nam June Paik, and festivals such as Documenta, Venice Film Festival, Cannes Film Festival, and the New York Film Festival. Key milestones include partnerships with organizations like Rhizome, Eyebeam, Creative Time, and the Walker Art Center, and programming intersections with institutions such as the Museum of Modern Art, Tate Modern, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, and Smithsonian Institution. Technological inflection points involved collaborations with Oculus VR, Google Arts & Culture, Microsoft Research, Intel, and Adobe Systems, reflecting ties to research labs like MIT Media Lab and academic programs at Columbia University, NYU Tisch School of the Arts, and UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television.
Program and Components
The program integrates exhibition formats—film, VR, AR, mixed reality, installations, live performance—and curatorial strands influenced by curators from The Kitchen, Serpentine Galleries, Hayward Gallery, and Paley Center for Media. Components include immersive installations, gallery commissions, artist residencies linked to MacDowell, Yaddo, and Headlands Center for the Arts, and workshops in partnership with SXSW, Tribeca Film Festival, and IDFA. Educational elements have been developed alongside Fulbright Program fellows, National Endowment for the Arts grants, and university labs such as CalArts and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Exhibition technologies showcased include headsets from HTC Vive, motion-capture systems like those produced by Vicon, volumetric capture techniques used by Microsoft Mixed Reality, and spatial audio practices promoted by Dolby Laboratories.
Notable Works and Filmmakers
New Frontier has presented works by artists and filmmakers whose careers intersect with institutions and prizes such as the Academy Awards, Pulitzer Prize, Turner Prize, and MacArthur Fellows Program. Notable participants include artists and directors associated with Ava DuVernay, Spike Jonze, James Cameron, Kathryn Bigelow, Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Werner Herzog, Lynne Ramsay, Chantal Akerman, Hirokazu Kore-eda, and multimedia practitioners linked to Marina Abramović, Pipilotti Rist, Bill Viola, Laurie Anderson, and Rafael Lozano-Hemmer. Projects have featured collaborations with producers and institutions such as Participant Media, A24, Focus Features, National Film Board of Canada, BBC Arts, and Arte France. Works presented have been in dialogue with canonical films and exhibitions like 2001: A Space Odyssey, Blade Runner, The Matrix, Dogville, and exhibitions at MoMA PS1.
Impact and Reception
Critics and scholars from outlets and institutions including The New York Times, The Guardian, Variety, The Hollywood Reporter, Artforum, Frieze, and academics from Harvard University, Yale University, Princeton University, Goldsmiths, and University of California, Berkeley have debated New Frontier’s role in shaping immersive storytelling. Reception has ranged from praise by curators at Tate Modern and programmers at Berlin International Film Festival to critique from theorists influenced by Marshall McLuhan, Roland Barthes, and Walter Benjamin. Its influence is evident in programming shifts at festivals such as Sundance Film Festival, South by Southwest, Tribeca, and Edinburgh International Film Festival, and in museum acquisitions by Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago and Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
Festivals and Events
New Frontier programs and pop-up exhibitions have appeared in contexts beyond Park City, including commissions at Venice Biennale, Whitney Biennial, Frieze London, Art Basel, and collaborations with regional festivals like SXSW, Telluride Film Festival, Rotterdam International Film Festival, Biennale of Sydney, and Berlinale. Touring exhibitions have been hosted at institutions including The Getty, ICA London, Kunstverein München, Centre Pompidou, and International Film Festival Rotterdam satellite events. The program’s panels and symposiums have included speakers from Nadia Tazi, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Anne Pasternak, and executives from companies like Sony Pictures Entertainment and Amazon Studios.
Funding and Partnerships
Funding and partnerships involve philanthropic foundations such as the Ford Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, Guggenheim Foundation, Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and corporate sponsors including Google, Facebook (Meta Platforms), Samsung Electronics, and AT&T. Institutional partners have included National Endowment for the Arts, New York State Council on the Arts, Utah Arts & Museums, and private patrons linked to Carnegie Corporation, Bloomberg Philanthropies, and tech incubators like Plug and Play Tech Center. Collaborative grants and commissioning funds have been administered in concert with producer organizations such as Sundance Institute, Tribeca Enterprises, Knight Foundation, and international co-producers like Canada Media Fund and Eurimages.