Introduction

Hybridity, identity, and the New Cosmopolitanism - these three "open-ended" concepts informed the basis of our curatorial choices for this festival, which is the concluding event in the University of Richmond's 2007-2008 Tucker-Boatwright Festival of Literature and the Arts. Our final selection of works was culled from more than 100 videos submitted from our call for participation and from international video art distributors, with the culmination of the festival consisting of the screening of Coco Fusco's "Operation Atropos." We derived the festival's purposely nebulous title early on to allow us leeway when deciding what work to include. But the title became prophetic as the chosen videos examine these overlapping themes from extremely varied perspectives. When determining the order of the programs for the first two nights, we created four loose groupings within which each video contributes another facet to the subject.

Identity Construction: Social, Political, and Personal
The New Cosmopolitanism: Civilization, Urbanism, and Isolation
Hybridity: Dislocation, Separation, Change, and Fear
Hybridity: Global Citizenship, Curiosity, and Confusion

Seen in totality, we hope that the videos in this festival present creative interpretations of these inter-related ideas relevant to contemporary society and examined throughout the entire Tucker-Boatwright Festival.

We would like to thank the following for their assistance in organizing, promoting, and presenting this festival: Liz Clark, Alicia McCarty, Hank West, Richard Roth, Samantha Sawyer, and the staff, faculty and students in the Department of Art and Art History and the University Museums, University of Richmond.