MIX18: The New York Queer Experimental Media Festival is re-launching with a 6-day celebration of the vital energy of artist’s collectives. From the notorious to the obscure, collective projects give voice to our politics, depth to our artwork and excitement to our nightlife. Opening day features 2 events that highlight how collective efforts are dynamic engines producing meaning beyond any single medium or individual. The new MIX is about more than fabulous short films & videos and we are happy to highlight this by kicking off the festival with a Work-in-Progress look at Cake a new site-specific video and performance installation being developed by video maker Mary		Ellen Strom and choreographer Ann Carlson. Cake will be installed in a 5,000 square foot empty retail store on the corner of Beekman and Front streets at New York City’s South Street Seaport. Using video projection, site, and performance, Cake explores the source-to-use trajectory of the apparel industry, presenting the labor, the environmental impact, and the economic/ethical complexities that face contemporary consumers. Cake is co-presented by MIX and the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council's MOVE Residency. Cake’s first performance will be the kick off event for this year’s festival at 6pm on Thursday April 7th. Afterwards (9:30pm) MIX is excited to host its Opening Night Happening at “Gallery”.		Beginning with our Opening Night shorts program Really Fucking Good featuring World Premieres of A Girl Named Kai by Kai Ling Xue, Perfect Match by Miguel Gutierrez, and the U.S. Premieres of Combien by Gilles Tillet and Laurent Coltelloni and Pull In by Eliza Steinbock, and festival favorite Viva Ruiz returns this year with Rosa Negra, Episode 2: Como Corre el Amor. Then the party really gets going with a multi-screen projection happening celebrating New York’s heyday of collaborative spirit and experimentation that was The Factory. Warhol’s films Couch & My Hustler and Barbara Rubin’s dual projection Christmas on Earth will screen in the front room with a new video projection/performance piece by and Rob Roth of		Click & Drag fame featuring Rock Goddess Theo Kogan as screen/performer. The Back lounge will feature Michel Auder’s Cleopatra (1970) a scene-by-scene improvisation of the Elizabeth Taylor/Richard Burton 1968 classic paired with the World Premiere of VIVA VIVA a new documentary by Michel & Viva’s son-in-law Nick Nehez. There will be screen tests sponsored by Kodak and gifts from the evenings Sponsor Treasure Island Media. All this will happen to the dance grooves of John Cameron Mitchel’s Short Bus crew. With our signature MIX of sexy polygendered gogo-people drink specials and downtown style this will be a classic evening celebrating the types of friendships & collaborations only New York can foster and an homage to the vitality of collective effort.