Chet Pancake

Chet Catherine Pancake[1] (née Catherine Pancake) is an American filmmaker and musician. They are a co-founder of the Red Room Collective, the High Zero Foundation, the Charm City Kitty Club and the Transmodern Festival. They are currently an assistant professor in the Film and Media Arts Program at Temple University and director of the Black Oak House Gallery. Their documentary film Black Diamonds (2006), an examination of mountaintop removal mining, has received a number of awards.

Chet Pancake
Born
Catherine Pancake

October 10, 1966 (1966-10-10) (age 54)
OccupationCinematographer

Personal

Pancake grew up in the areas of Romney, West Virginia and Summersville, West Virginia, and moved to Baltimore in 1993.[2][3] Their sister is writer Ann Pancake,[4] and their brother is actor Sam Pancake.[5] The writer Breece D'J Pancake was also a relative.

Career

In Baltimore Pancake co-founded the Red Room Collective and High Zero Foundation. They also became a self-trained improvising percussionist and began making films, which ranged from short, experimental meditations to feature-length narratives and documentaries. They are a founding member of the Charm City Kitty Club (GLBT Performance Series) and the Transmodern Festival (Live.Art.Action.)[3]

Pancake currently lives in Philadelphia, where they are assistant professor in the Film and Media Arts Program at Temple University and director of Black Oak House Gallery.[6]

Beginning around 2001, their primary project was a documentary about the mountaintop removal project of the coal in southern West Virginia and its resulting environmental and humanitarian consequences titled Black Diamonds. Black Diamonds: Mountaintop Removal & The Fight for Coalfield Justice was released by Bull Frog Films for distribution in December 2006.[7]

Pancake received a master's degree in fine arts at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in May 2012. As recipient of the Edes Foundation Emerging Artist Fellowship, they began the film Genius Project as their Edes Year project. In it they document five avant-garde artists who identify as queer women: Eileen Myles, Barbara Hammer, Jibz Cameron, Shannon Funchess[8] and Rasheedah Phillips.[9]

Since 2012, Pancake has been directing Queer Genius, a documentary interviewing and following queer-identifying artists Eileen Myles, Barbara Hammer, Shannon Funchess, and Jibz Cameron.[10]

Film and videography
  • 2006 release, Black Diamonds: Mountaintop Removal & The Fight for Coalfield Justice, DV 72 minutes;[11] screened at the Documentary Fortnight Series at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) Feb 2008[12][13]
  • 2009, Jay Dreams[3]
  • 2010, bitterbittertears[14]
  • 2011, Optical Scores[3]

Awards
  • 2002, Maryland State Arts Council Individual Artist Award[5]
  • 2006, Key to the City, South Charleston, West Virginia[15]
  • 2006, Paul Robeson Independent Media Award[5]
  • 2007, Jack Spadaro Documentary Award[5]
  • 2007, Silver Chris Award – Best in Science & Technology Division – Columbus International Film Festival[5]
  • 2012, Edes Foundation Emerging Artist Fellowship at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago[8]
  • 2013, American Composers Forum, Subito grant for Axon Ladder, Bhob Rainey, Catherine Pancake, Meg Foley[16]
  • 2014, Pew Center for Arts & Heritage “No Idea Too Ridiculous” grant for Allele Wake, Catherine Pancake, Bhob Rainey, Christina Zani[17]

References
  1. "Chet Catherine Pancake". Leeway Foundation. Retrieved February 1, 2021.
  2. "Growing Up Without Television . . . Trials and Tribulations of Developing Visual Media in a Culture of Oral Tradition A talk by Catherine Pancake" (PDF). Marshall University Graduate College. Retrieved March 12, 2017.
  3. "Catherine Pancake". Baltimore Filmmakers. April 23, 2012.
  4. McCabe, Bret (March 29, 2006). "Tragic Mountains: Local Filmmaker Catherine Pancake Hopes To Bring the Devastation of Mountaintop Removal Mining To a Theater Near You". Baltimore City Paper. Archived from the original on July 22, 2012. Retrieved March 12, 2017.CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  5. "Nature Is Hungry A screening of films by Catherine Pancake". Vox Populi. October 22, 2016.
  6. The Galleries at Moore. "The Convo: Catherine Pancake". Retrieved March 3, 2017.
  7. "Black Diamonds: Mountaintop Removal & The Fight For Coalfield Justice". Bullfrog Films. Retrieved March 3, 2017.
  8. "Catherine Pancake". Claire Rosen & Samuel Edes Foundation. Retrieved March 12, 2017.
  9. Thomas, Emily (November 8, 2016). "Professor creates film on the 'genius' of queer artists". Temple News. Retrieved March 12, 2017.
  10. Pancake, Catherine. "Queer Genius". Kickstarter. Catherine Pancake. Retrieved March 13, 2018.
  11. "Maryland Today". Washington Post. April 19, 2007. Retrieved March 12, 2017.
  12. ""Black Diamonds" Mountaintop Removal Documentary". Appalachian Voices. February 7, 2008.
  13. "Movies". The New York Times. February 29, 2008. Retrieved March 12, 2017.
  14. "Catherine Pancake's bitterbittertears". Baltimore City Paper. September 22, 2010. Retrieved March 12, 2017.
  15. "Black Diamonds Movie". OVEC. March 11, 2006.
  16. "Bhob Rainey 2013 Pew Fellow". Pew Center for Arts & Heritage. Retrieved March 12, 2017.
  17. "Allele Wake (2014) w/ Bhob Rainey & Christina Zani". Catherine Pancake. Retrieved March 12, 2017.

Further reading
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