Julie Pacino: Keepers of the Inn
April 29th, 2022
Arts journalist Jo Lawson-Tancred speaks with photographer and filmmaker Julie Pacino about their rule breaking NFT film project, Keepers of the Inn, as she shakes up film funding, creative independence and democratising the way works are created.
Struggling with a bad bout of writer’s block in February of last year, photographer and filmmaker Julie Pacino decided to leave LA and book into the Madonna Inn in the small city of San Luis Obispo. She planned to mix-up mediums and try experimenting with her camera instead. ‘It was born out of this desire to go and play with no pressure,’ she says. ‘I wasn’t there to take photos, just to be creative.’ The motel, which is infamous for its highly distinctive, predominantly pink decor, was saturated with visual cues. As she photographed her friend, a new character began to emerge and the pair mused on who she might be. ‘Photography has always been intriguing to me because of the ability to tell a story in a single frame,’ she says. Her imagination captivated by the location, Pacino returned with more models and a whole roster of characters organically emerged.
At the same time, NFT mania was taking the art world by storm thanks to the headline-making $69m sale of Beeple’s Everydays at Christie’s in March. A friend of Pacino’s, the NFT collector William Savas, predicted that photographs, naturally suited to the typical jpeg format of most NFTs, were poised to take-off. ‘He really helped me wrap my head around the blockchain and why someone would want to spend money on a jpeg of mine,’ she says. Pacino became aware of successful projects like Justin Aversano’s Twin Flames, already highly coveted by collectors on OpenSea. Also a series of portraits, Pacino’s seductively cinematic stills show women inhabiting the retro hotel rooms in scenes that are ambiguous and psychologically charged.
In August, Savas helped Pacino curate and drop her genesis collection of photographs I Live Here Now. Composed of 100 of the initial photos taken at the Madonna Inn Hotel, the series sold out in under 30 minutes.
‘I was instantly thrust into this amazing world where there were collectors and art patrons, and I was having really stimulating conversations about the photos,’ she recalls. The works had also inspired her to write a whole new script for a horror film set at the Madonna Inn. ‘It just poured out of me’, says Pacino, of the idea that centres around a disillusioned young actress who escapes to the inn after discovering she is pregnant but encounters unsettling forces there.
“Photography has always been intriguing to me because of the ability to tell a story in a single frame.”
After finding a distribution company, she sought out financing but found herself repeatedly frustrated by her conversations with traditional investors. ‘I didn’t feel like they were understanding my vision and they were just wanting to force it into a box’ she says. ‘Meanwhile, I’m in the NFT space having the complete opposite types of conversation with art collectors about the story. They were interested in what happens to the characters.’ Suddenly the potential of harnessing this new community clicked in Pacino’s mind. ‘I had an audience that I could develop this film with and for. People who understand my art and who bought into these photos as a sort of proof of concept.’ She dropped a new series, Keepers of the Inn, consisting of 3,356 photos taken while rehearsing scenes at the inn.
So far, the community of ‘keepers’ has grown organically to some 1,200 holders. Among the benefits to collectors is access to Pacino’s creative process through her regular ‘town hall’ meetings on Twitter. ‘In a very candid way I share where I’m at in the creative process,’ she explains. ‘I ask them for their feedback on certain decisions that I’m making.’ Pacino believes this interactivity has gamified the collection. ‘We are encouraging the audience to find the story within the photos.’ Other perks of buying multiple NFTs include receiving merch, and even receiving producer credits or getting an invitation to the wrap party.
Pacino likens the collectors’ involvement to a market screening, but before the film is shot. ‘To me, the most exciting thing about buying into a film project would be hearing the director’s process because I’m a junkie for that process. I love knowing all of the steps and thoughts that go into making a vision,’ she says. ‘With this drop I’m inviting my community to watch me make those decisions and to sometimes help me make them.’
“To me, the most exciting thing about buying into a film project would be hearing the director’s process because I’m a junkie for that process. I love knowing all of the steps and thoughts that go into making a vision.”
So far 296 ETH has been raised by primary sales and some 190 ETH through secondary sales. A portion of this sum will fund three grants awarded to short film proposals, with the aim of supporting women filmmakers. Acting as a sort of DAO, or decentralised autonomous organisation, members of the community get a vote on who wins the grants. The remaining ETH will fund Pacino’s film I Live Here Now, which starts shooting in September. In the meantime, she has dropped Modern Muse, her genesis NFT project on the curated marketplace SuperRare. The subject of this highly personal photo series is Pacino’s partner Adi Spiegelman, and she says the process has helped her be more open about her sexuality. ‘It’s really an essay on embracing one’s own identity’, she says.
Pacino hopes the much touted advent of web3 will give more power back to creators. ‘There’s a big disconnect between the studio system in Hollywood and mainstream audiences and so with this project we’re seeking to highlight that and prove that there can be an audience for a film that is thought-provoking and different, and unique to me rather than fitting some outdated formula,’ she says. The community she’s built so far, Pacino believes, are in it for the long haul. ‘The way to prove this is a viable case study is just to make a movie that’s really good and does well in real life but was born in the NFT space. That’s really the value in this project.’
About Julie Pacino
Julie Pacino is a Los Angeles based photographer and filmmaker. In her work, Julie features subjects that exist between binaries and their expected roles. Her photographs and films spark conversations about the interplay between sexuality and power, the communal and the autocratic, and frequently use horror to embody existing power structures.
Julie was most recently chosen as part of the TIME PIECES NFT initiative, “Build a Better Future” .