History and Application of Infringement Festivals in Buffalo and Beyond

by Robyn Duncan

 

In 1947, as an attempt at an artistic renaissance post-WWII, an international festival of the arts was planned in Edinburgh. Several hoity-toity ballets, orchestras, and opera companies were invited to perform, yet poorly funded but thriving local theatre companies were not. These companies obviously saw the festival as misaimed towards the bourgeois and ignoring the working class and as a result decided to host their own performances in unused venues in Edinburgh during the festival. They called themselves “Festival Adjuncts” until 1948, wherein the Scottish playright and journalist, Robert Kemp referred to them using the term “fringe.”

Since then, Fringe Festivals began popping up as an international movement, especially in the 1960s with groups such as Beyond the Fringe in Britain, and several other free and experimental theatre groups throughout Europe. In the US, experimental theatre was booming in the 1960s as a result of political protest against the Vietnam War and has spread since.

The primary characteristics of a Fringe/Infringement Festival are their qualifications for entry. While most art festivals utilize a jury to select their participants, Fringe/Infringement Festivals are open to all and follow specific mandates in order to safeguard the integrity of the artists. However, the main differentiation between Fringe and Infringe came about in 1990, when the Canadian Association of Fringe Festivals (CAFF) formed out of fear that festivals and organizations operation outside the “Fringe” ideals would use the term “fringe” in their work. Later in 1998, they trademarked the term in order to enforce strict guidelines on all Fringe Festivals. They are as follows according to the CAFF website:

CAFF PRINCIPLES:

1. Participants will be selected on a non-juried basis, through a first-come, first served process, a lottery, or other method approved by the Association
2. In order to ensure Criteria One (above), the audiences must have the option to pay a ticket price, 100% of which goes directly to the artists.
3. Fringe Festival producers have no control over the artistic content of each performance. The artistic freedom of the participants is unrestrained.
4. Festivals must provide an easily accessible opportunity for all audiences and all artists to participate in Fringe Festivals.

MANDATE:

• To safeguard the integrity of Fringe Festivals as outlined in the four minimum criteria
• To recognize that the health of all member Festivals is important to the Circuit and therefore the artists’ health as a whole
• To encourage communication and cooperation between member Festivals thereby fostering the continuity of our guiding principles

Now the only “Infringement” Festivals are Buffalo and Montreal, both of which were rejected when they applied to join the first World Fringe Festival in 2016, wherein their representatives were going to question the trademark. Personally, I am much more familiar with and interested in Infringement Festivals, primarily the Buffalo Infringement Festival, which are based on the rejection of corporate control over art movements, and work towards a unification of community via art and exclusion of the commodification of culture.

I believe that in order to fully understand Buffalo and the Infringement Festival, you must first have somewhat of an idea of its geography in relation to its history.

Buffalo is quite literally a city split down the middle in regards to its lines of segregation. It is one of the most racially segregated cities in America, and due to redlining, its racial makeup has not changed much in the last 100 years. In addition to red-lining, the black population has  remained in the East Side due to transit racism wherein bus stations to and from the black neighborhoods to the locations where they were able to find jobs were few and far between and placed in incredibly dangerous locations (such as the side of an expressway). The majority black population still lives in the East Side of Buffalo, the white upper middle class live in North Buffalo and the Kombucha Liberals (coined by my 11th grade art student) live in Elmwood Village. My family currently resides in South Buffalo (primarily home to the Irish) and I went to high school in Masten (hospitals, high schools, and projects). The Buffalo Infringement Festival’s major operations take place throughout Allentown, the area below the Elmwood Village and adjacent to the historic Fruit Belt (a very diverse up-and-coming neighborhood).

Going to school in Masten Park and living in the culturally lacking South Buffalo, my best friend, Jill (another South Buffalonian) and I were always on the hunt of something cool to experience in either Elmwood or Allentown, the artistic hub of Buffalo. When we came across a flier for the Infringement Festival stapled to a telephone pole on Elmwood, we immediately were drawn in. We found an itinerary in the now-dead independent newspaper The Public and one of the first events I recall attending was an improv show by the two-man group BABUSHKA! in the back of a used bookstore in the Upper West Side called Rust Belt Books. We sat in a semicircle with a dozen other audience members, who we quickly made friends with just due to the intimacy of the set-up. Then Don Gervasi and Todd Benzin of BABUSHKA! entered the circle and gave a hysterical performance that left my mom in tears.

Since then, I have been to film screenings in stranger’s backyards, numerous concerts in a variety of venues including independent bars, restaurants, and bookstores, and one summer I fairly accidentally attended 5 or more burlesque shows in bars and backyards with my friends.

When tackling this project of placing Infringement in the lens of Third Cinema, I contacted Ryan Gurnett, the first person who responded to my facebook message and the music coordinator of the Buffalo Infringement Festival. We got together via zoom and discussed Infringement’s operations, their relationships to other festivals, their mandate, and their hopes for the future.

In comparison to the CAFF’s mission statement for Fringe Festivals, Infringement’s is as follows:

To avoid being co-opted, the infringement festival follows a mandate that looks like this:

1. The infringement festival is free for all artists and activists to participate in. The festival will never charge a registration fee and participants will keep 100% of their box office.
2. The festival is open to all critical artists and will never discriminate, set entry criteria or censor.
3. The festival is run as a non-hierarchical arts democracy.
4. The festival will only accept ethical companies that pose no conflict of interest as sponsors, as the interests of the festival’s participants come before those of the sponsors. (our criteria for ethical sponsorship is available here)
5. The festival will encourage, although not be limited to, progressive acts that encourage discussion and oppose oppressive structures.

Ryan explained to me that unlike Fringe Festivals who are heavily devoted to their corporate sponsors who call the shots, Buffalo Infringement runs almost entirely on fundraising that they raise through the selling of merch on their yearly Festivus Party and through monthly fundraisers from December to July. They open for submissions in April and in May they reach out to their local venues, all of which volunteer their spaces free of charge to the Festival. They typically operate on a budget of less than $4000, they charge no entry fee, provide all their artists liability insurance, which is a specifically Infringe ideal. The Rochester Fringe Festival (now called the KeyBank Rochester Fringe Festival) charged $110 for an entry submission and then $105 for liability insurance despite having corporate sponsors such as KeyBank, New York State, the YMCA, etc., etc. Buffalo Infringement also provides projectors, cameras, fliers, and Ryan emphasized how they dedicated a chunk of their budget to make sure they have tip jars available for all artists anywhere where there isn’t a door charge (which always goes entirely to the artists).

However, most importantly, Buffalo Infringement Festival wants to connect with Buffalonians. As stated previously, its various acts take place in and around Allentown, Elmwood, and the West Side, while the East side has been closed off from the rest of Buffalo for ages. Ryan also expressed frustration in the difficulty to get around in Allentown and Elmwood, and cited the lack of vehicle access in these neighborhoods as the major roadblock towards their expansion into other neighborhoods. As seen in the map to the right, expanding into the East Side is fundamentally difficult as walkability ceases once driveability begins. However, Infringement is still dedicated to making every voice heard (short of hate-speech, Ryan clarified) and hopes to join forces and hand the mic over to younger, more diverse artists and activists as time goes on. This has already begun as Infringement has started taking on more and more interns from local SUNYs, and sought out relationships with more and more venues that are not 21+ in order to invigorate the young music and art scene in Buffalo.

Overall, this research process not only opened my eyes to the political differences between Fringe and Infringe, but illustrated that the ethics of Third Cinema are alive in Buffalo, but that the foundational system of oppression in place in our country affects every level of development, including the development of an art festival. Below are links to a variety of reading materials on Buffalo, Buffalo Infringement, and a spattering of artists actively working against the artistic corporate machine.

 

Buffalo Infringement Website: Includes information about who they are, what they’re doing, and a cute little trailer.

2020 Buffalo Infringement Festival: The 2020 Buffalo Infringement Festival was entirely online due to COVID-19, and is completely available to view on Youtube at this link.

PDF on the history of segregation in Buffalo: Important for a brief understanding of Buffalo’s History and changes since.

Growing Smarter: Achieving Livable Communities, Environmental Justice, and Regional Equity: Excerpt wherein the transit racism in Buffalo is expressed.

DARSOMBRA: Incredible performances from musical group DARSOMBA. Just so cool.

Pocket Vinyl–  Husband and wife 2 piece band wherein Eric plays and Elizabeth paints during their set and they auction off the painting at the end of the set. They are also featured in the documentary Drive Play Sleep.

St. John and the Other Monsters– Ryan’s excellent local band.