January 2, 2026
Amos Poe (1949 – December 25, 2025): No Wave Films and the DIY 1970s
Newsletter
In the mid-1970s, Amos Poe was one of the shining lights of the downtown art scene. Inspired by the new bands at CBGB, and the improvisational techniques of French New Wave cinema, Poe showed that you did not need a large budget — or any budget at all — to create…
August 22, 2024
Amos Poe’s No Wave Film The Foreigner, Photos by Fernando Natalici, 1978
Newsletter
Rarely screened today, The Foreigner lives on primarily through the excellent on-set photographs taken by Fernando Natalici to publicize the film. Gallery 98 has a number of vintage resin-coated prints made from the original negatives by Natalici in the early 1990s when The Foreigner was first released as a VHS video. All prints are signed and annotated by Natalici.
March 7, 2024
Downtown Independent Films: Posters and Flyers, 1970s & 1980s
Newsletter
While few of these films were commercial successes, they provide a glimpse of the passions that fueled the East Village art scene during a creative highpoint. These low-budget, Super-8 productions embody the period’s do-it-yourself ethos, as well as, the fusion of art, music and club culture that animated the downtown…
July 8, 2021
THE OFFENDERS BY SCOTT B & BETH B, 1979 No Wave’s Fusion of Art, Music and Club Culture
Newsletter
If one wanted to encapsulate with a single work the spirit of the downtown art scene in the late 1970s, an appropriate choice might be Beth B & Scott B’s independent film The Offenders. A “savage satire” full of violence and nihilism, this low budget Super 8 film embodies the period’s…