JOEL KATZ
Full Professor and Chair, Media Arts Department
Film & Video Productions (Producer/Director/Writer/Editor)
2012
WHITE: A MEMOIR IN COLOR, a personal film that explores what it means to be
white in America, told through the story of my own family across generations. New
York Jewish Film Festival; San Francisco Jewish Film Festival,; Kopkind Grassroots
Film Festival; National Conference on Race & Ethnicity in American Higher Education
2013; international screenings in Warsaw, Poland and Jerusalem, Israel; distributed by
Filmmakers Library and Canamedia, Inc.
2004
THE COWBELL IN THE TREE, a documentary short about Jim Morton, a 90 year old
land caretaker in the Catskill Mountains. Woodstock Film Festival, 2004; Director’s
Choice, Black Maria Film Festival, 2005; Pacific Film Archive, 2005.
2002
STRANGE FRUIT, a documentary about the famed anti-lynching protest song of the
same title, written in the mid-1930's by Bronx high school teacher Abel Meeropol and
made famous by Billie Holiday. Broadcast on the national PBS series Independent
Lens; theatrical showings at Film Forum (NY); Roxie Cinema (San Francisco);
Coolidge Corner Theater (Boston); broadcast in Australia, Belgium, France, Finland,
Denmark, the Netherlands, and Romania; festival screenings nationally and
internationally; numerous awards. See more at www.pbs.org/strangefruit
1999
JOHNNY & CLYDE , a feature film script based on a weekend trip the late FBI
Director John Edgar Hoover made to Mexico with his lifelong personal companion
Clyde Tolson. Co-written with Tal McThenia.
1997
DEAR CARRY, a videotape about cameras and travel, based on archival footage shot
around the world in the forties and fifties by Carry Wagner, a teacher, jeweler,
Suffragette, and Greenwich Village bohemian. Screened in: the “New Documentary”
series at the Museum of Modern Art, NY; Pacific Film Archive; American Film
Institute Festival, and various other festivals.
1992
CORPORATION WITH A MOVIE CAMERA, an experimental documentary about
the role corporations have played in shaping the American public's perceptions of the
developing world. PBS broadcast, New Television, 1995; many festivals nationally and
internationally.
1992
DAT'S ENTERTAINMENT, a vaudeville/performance tape about Coca-Cola, the
Philippines, and cultural imperialism, written by the novelist and poet Jessica
Hagedorn. On PBS as part of The Learning Channel's But Seriously, Folks, 1994.
Joel Katz - resumé page two
1990
GULF BOWL, segment of the Gulf Crisis TV Project's News World Order. Shown as
part of the Whitney Museum of American Art Biennial, 1992.
1985
MNEMONIC STUDY: ELLIS ISLAND FRAGMENTS, a 35 minute experimental
documentary film. Collective for Living Cinema, NY; Interart/Berlin super 8 Film
Festival; Jewish Museum, NY; Millennium Film Workshop, NY.
1984
ONIERA, an experimental super-8 film. Collective for Living Cinema, NY; San
Francisco Cinematheque; Berlin Film Festival 1986; Millennium Film Workshop, NY;
London Film Festival 1989.
Grants, Awards, and Residencies
2010
Puffin Foundaiton Grant for WHITE: A MEMOIR IN COLOR
2009
MacDowell Colony Residency for WHITE: A MEMOIR IN COLOR
2006
Kopkind Residency for Documentary Film (named after the radical journalist Andrew
Kopkind), Guilford, Vermont.
2005
New York State Council on the Arts, production grant for WHITE: A MEMOIR IN
COLOR
2004
Paul Robeson Fund for Independent Media, pre-production grant for WHITE: A
MEMOIR IN COLOR
2003-4 Cultural Guest of the U.S. Embassy, Denmark and Romania
2003
Cross Cultural Production Award, Jewish Image Awards in Film and Television,
National Foundation for Jewish Culture (for “Strange Fruit”)
2003
Erik Barnouw Award (Honorable Mention), Organization of American Historians (for
“Strange Fruit”)
2002
Grand Jury Prize for “Strange Fruit”, USA Film Festival, Dallas, TX
2000
Independent Television Service (ITVS) funding for STRANGE FRUIT.
1999
National Foundation for Jewish Culture, Fund for Documentary Filmmaking production grant for STRANGE FRUIT. Also received funding from the Mary Duke
Biddle Trust and the Puffin Foundation.
1999
New York State Council on the Arts funding for JOHNNY & CLYDE.
1997
U.S./Mexico Fund for Culture, production development grant for
JOHNNY & CLYDE.
Joel Katz - resumé page three
1995
National Endowment for the Arts Visual Artists Fellowship Grant.
1995
National Endowment for the Arts Media Production Award for JOHNNY &
CLYDE .
1995
Artist's Residency, Banff Centre for the Arts, Banff, Alberta, Canada, for DEAR
CARRY.
1995
New York State Council on the Arts - production support for DEAR CARRY.
1995
Writer's Residency, The MacDowell Colony, Peterborough, NH.
1995
Jerome Foundation Award, production support for DEAR CARRY.
1995
Writer's residency for script development of JOHNNY & CLYDE, Ucross
Foundation, Ucross, Wyoming.
1994
Art Matters, Inc., production support for DEAR CARRY.
1990
New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship in Video.
1990
Electronic Arts Grants Program Finishing Funds and Residency, both from the
Experimental Television Center, Owego, NY.
1989
Funded residency at Sculpture Space in Utica, NY, provided by the New York State
Council for the Arts Film Installation Program.
1989
New York State Council for the Arts Literature Program, partial funding for
CORPORATION WITH A MOVIE CAMERA.
Education
1986
1985
1980
M.F.A. , Hunter College, Combined Media in Sculpture and Film
Whitney Museum Independent Study Program
B.A., Oberlin College, Studio Art/Art History
Academic & Teaching Experience
2012
Promoted to Full Professor, Media Arts Department, New Jersey City
University.
2011
Appointed Chair, Media Arts Department, NJCU. Repsonsible for working
with 8 full-time and 2 part-time teaching faculty and a support staff of 4;
managing budgets, recruitment and enrollments, curriculum development, etc.
2008
Joel Katz - resumé page four
Fulbright Scholar, Senior Specialist Program. Taught a month-long graduate
seminar at the University of Mainz, Germany titled “Towards a Poetics of
Non-Fiction Film.”
1996-
Professor, Media Arts Department, New Jersey City University, Jersey City,
NJ. Teach courses in all phases of video production and post-production.
Active as faculty advisor, committee member, and in the design of a graduate
MFA program set to launch in Fall 2014.
1994
Instructor, Professional Training Workshop in On-Line Editing, for the
production staff of WNYC-TV (PBS) , New York.
1992-93
School of Visual Arts, NY. Instructor of a one-year introductory course in
video theory and production.
1989-92
Instructor, Documentary Production Workshop, Downtown Community
Television Center, NY. An intensive 12 week course including all phases of
documentary video.
1987-89
Instructor of Video Production, Rise and Shine Productions, a not-for-profit
media literacy organization working in New York City public schools.
Taught in a program for 'at-risk' and ESL high school students, emphasizing
basic literacy skills.
Related Professional Experience
201119991993-95
1990-93
Member, Board of Directors, Black Maria Film Festival
Member, Board of Directors, Third World Newsreel
Freelance cameraman, editor, and sound recordist for a wide variety of Public
Television and independently produced projects.
Senior Production Technician, WNYC-TV (a now-defunct New York City
PBS televison station).
Served as Panelist, Juror, or Speaker for:
Black Maria Film Festival
Children’s Media Project, Poughkeepsie, New York
Hamptons International Film Festival
Independent Feature Project
New Jersey Young Filmmaker’s Festival
National Endowment for the Humanities, Television Production Grants
National Foundation for Jewish Culture
Woodstock Film Festival
Guest Faculty, “Arts in America”, 35th Annual American Studies Seminar, Berlin
Germany.
Keynote Speaker, “Documentaries: Whose Truth?”, a symposium by the Columbus
Jewish Film Festival held at the Wexner Center, Columbus, Ohio