Meet Ava Wolf, 17, and Cameran Ford, 18, filmmakers of The Queen’s Closet, a short doc about freedom of expression and drag in SF that won the Tam Unified Film Festival and is also appearing at the Mill Valley Film Festival this year. Thrilled to connect with these brilliant young female visionaries whose careers are just starting!
HSV: How did the making of this film all start?
CF: We got a long and wordy prompt that was very school-driven [laughter]: Make a film about a local story on art as a way to join a community over a substantive issue. We knew we wanted to do something with drag but weren’t sure where to start, so we literally walked up and down Haight. We walked into Piedmont Boutique, and it’s such a magical dream empire! We said, “We need to talk to these people!”
HSV: Had you had much exposure to the Haight?
CF: I never knew how much it was involved in starting drag and the culture of openness and acceptance. I got a whole new perspective on the Haight after making this documentary.
AW: After getting involved in the history of the Haight and the LGBTQ movement in SF, we were able to immerse ourselves in what goes on there, especially with Piedmont and the people there. Cam and I grew a lot making this documentary. We realized that we could make our own creative choices. Art is what I’m going to do. I wouldn’t have been okay exploring that path if I had not let go of the perspective of things being shoved on me by society, by people around me. To suppress any part of yourself makes it impossible to explore the entirety of yourself. I think letting go of that is something that everybody can do.
CF: It doesn’t matter we got the worst grade in class.This is so much more than that.
HSV: What does Season of the Witch mean to you?
CF: It makes me excited! I have this witchy, powerful side inside and I get to unleash it! I love mystical stuff like that. I’m learning about unicorns and femininity.
HSV: You’ve got to meet Sunshine Powers of Love on Haight. She’s all about unicorns!
CF: I went there a couple years ago and I was taking photos through this [holds a large green crystal]. I used it in the opening shot of The Queen’s Closet! This crystal has shaped my personal cinematography style!
AW: Haight Street is very magical. All it took was to walk into Piedmont to decide what we wanted to do. The idea of just expression and embracing your true self was something Cam and I were going through, and the Haight drew that out. It’s so open. It was the perfect place to explore those things.
HSV: Thank you school system for giving you a bad grade and driving you to the Haight — and to winning an award and being in the Mill Valley Film Festival! And thank you Cameran and Ava for keeping the magic alive!
— End of Print Article —
FULL TRANSCRIPT OF INTERVIEW:
Haight Street Voice: Okay! Hey y’all, this is the Haight Street Voice and I am so stoked to introduce Cameran Ford and Ava Wolf to Haight Street Voice for edition number 13 — lucky number 13, “Season of the Witch”, which is nothing but women. I’m so stoked to have you guys here, welcome!
Ava Wolf: Thank you!
HSV: You’re welcome! And the reason we’re here is that I was approached by Timothy Buckwalter of Larsen Associates about the Mill Valley Film Festivals that they have and that your film, The Queen’s Closet, won the Tam Unified Film Festival [and being shown at the Mill Valley Film Festival!]
Cameran Ford: Mmmhmm!
HSV: So, if you guys want to introduce yourselves and tell me how the film all came about, and we’ll go from there!
CF: Sweet. I can go first. Hello, my name is Cameron Ford, I am 18 years old and I am currently a freshman in college.
HSV: Ooh! What college? Sorry to interrupt, Ava! What college?
CF: I’m studying film production at Chapman University.
HSV: Woohoo! Alright, go ahead Ava!
AW: My name is Ava Wolf, I’m 17 and I’m a senior at Tamalpais High School in Mill Valley.
HSV: Obviously, you guys have known each other for a long time? How did you start to work together for this film?
AW: So, Tam’s got a program called AIM, which is the Academy of Integrated Humanities and New Media, and it’s kind of an experimental learning program where students are taught how to make documentary films about local and substantive issues. So Cam and I were both enrolled in the program because it’s a junior and senior program, they have both grades involved.
We, I think, Cam, we had art together at Tam, so we knew of each other but were not really involved, or friends, until our final semester where we were tasked to make a documentary about art and about its impact on communities. Yeah.
CF: Yeah, I never really knew Ava, and then we started working on the documentary together, and we just fit together so perfectly .
HSV: Wow!
CF: And now she’s like my best friend in the whole world!
AW: Yeah! I’ve never clicked with someone like Cam and I have. We have all these weird things that you just would never think we would have in common, but we do! We’re very different people but also very similar in a lot of ways. I think the doc worked out so well just because creatively we both were able to play off of each other. Cam’s really good at certain things and I’m good at certain things, and we kind of were able to balance each other out where we weren’t good at certain parts or aspects of creating films or interacting with people or whatever it was.
HSV: So what would you say are your fortes, what are you good at? Say, Ava, you start. What’s your “thing”?
AW: I feel like in making that doc I have less experience with the film side of things, whether it was editing or physically filming or piecing stuff together. So I kind of handled the writing and contacting people and doing interviews. I was managing that side of things whereas Cam was kind of filmmaker, in a sense, yeah! [laughs]
CF: Yeah, Ava’s like the dream producer! [laughter all around!] Ava gets stuff done, and she’s also super, super creative and artistic.
Yeah, I definitely feel like I was on the editing front, but we did everything together. Ava’s just a very good coordinator.
HSV: Cool. And what made you come to the Haight? How did this whole happen with the Haight? Because as I was saying earlier to you guys before we started recording, it’s like I probably wouldn’t be talking to you — you know, but you’re gonna be famous in a few years, but — you probably wouldn’t be in this edition of the Haight Street Voice if it were not for the Larsen Associates reaching out to me about the Mill Valley film festivals, and you guys won, as I said, the Tam Unified Film Festival. How did you pick the Haight? How did that all start?
CF: We got a very long and wordy prompt for school that was very school-driven [laughter]. But basically it was make a film about a local story about art as a way to join a community over a substantive issue, or something like that. And Ava and I were stoked because we love an art prompt!
I think we knew we wanted to do something with drag but we weren’t sure where to start, so we literally just walked up and down the Haight, and up and down Castro, just going into all the businesses that looked like they had something to say and we just talked to people. And we walked into Piedmont, you walk in there and it’s like a whole other world! It’s just like such a magical dream empire! It’s incredible! So were were like, “We need to talk to these people! Who is this? Where am I!?” And that’s kind of how it started.
AW: The prompt — I just want to emphasize that it was very, like, school, you know? We took a very untraditional route when it came to the prompt. Our teachers actually didn’t love our film. [laughter]
CF: We got a bad grade!
HSV: Really?!
AW: We totally got a bad grade! The worst grade out of our class! [laughter] Because it was so artistic, you know? And it was, to us at least, it was a very important topic, and drag as an artwork was totally fine when it came to the art piece, and then, I don’t know, they just thought that it was … I don’t even know what they thought! [laughs]
CF: It wasn’t interesting enough.
AW: Yeah.
HSV: Had you had much exposure to Haight Street? You guys live in Marin, right?
CF: Yeah.
HSV: Had you guys really — I mean, obviously your parents are pretty dang cool if you’re making a movie like this! They’re pretty hip. You have good folks, apparently. But you know, had you been to the Haight, you knew about the hippies and all that. Give us a little background on your experience of the Haight.
CF: I’ve been to the Haight a few times, but it was like, “Let’s go to the Haight and take cool pictures and look at the shops. I never really experienced it or knew what it was all about. I never knew the history and how much it was involved in starting drag and starting the culture of openness and acceptance. But yeah, I got a whole new perspective on the Haight after making this documentary for sure.
HSV: Wow, that’s awesome to hear! We like that. How about you, Ava?
AW: I think both of us, we grew up in this area, the Bay Area, and both spent a lot of time in the City and on the Haight, but never really immersed ourselves inside of the culture there just because we weren’t necessarily a part of it, just because we didn’t live there, we didn’t necessarily know anyone there. We knew the Haight, we could go walk around in the Haight and hang out in the City and have fun and whatever, but it wasn’t necessarily our community.
HSV: Right.
AW: But after getting involved with drag and getting involved in the kind of the specifics of the history in Haight and the history of the LGBTQ movement in San Francisco, we were really able to immerse ourselves in everything that goes on there — especially with the Piedmont Boutique and with the people there.
HSV: Uti — yay! I live right around the corner for the last … forever. I love Uti, she’s amazing.
So how did you find the person behind me and explain how that all kind of manifested. Was this an old friend of yours, or how did that work?
AW: I think with the school program and it being school, we only had so much time, I think we had 6 weeks to create this whole documentary, and you are just scrambling to find whatever you can wherever you can. We were reaching out to people that, you know, from any platform anywhere ever that we’d heard of, seen. And I think I found Blake on instagram after just doing a random search for “SF drag”, and just sent this big long DM being like, “I love you! Please talk to us! We need you!” [laughter] And we literally just showed up at their house, and it was just amazing! Everyone that we talked to was so willing, and so excited to help us with our project and help us with our vision of what we wanted to do.
I mean, it takes a lot of do drag. It’s a lot of time, it’s a lot of energy, money … and everyone was like, “Yes! I would love to dress up in drag for you! Please come talk with us!” They just wanted to share and it was great!
HSV: That’s awesome. That’s so amazing. It’s really beautiful to hear, young women your age really realizing the whole thing of — and that’s partially what this edition of the magazine is about, is the oppression of the feminine and the whole thing about the season of the witch and how if women have power they’re considered a bitch or a witch, and that whole thing. And you guys are really, clearly, steamrolling past that at your young age, which is so badass.
I was saying to you earlier, Cameran, that I — hey y’all, whoever’s watching this, you gotta go watch “Death of a Unicorn”. It’s so amazing! The music’s amazing, the whole idea of “be your own best friend”, that whole message is just so freakin’ awesome!
CF: [smiles]
HSV: Sorry I’m cursing in front of you young women! [laughter] You’ve heard the word “fuck” before? Sorry! [laughter]. Sorry mom and dad!
Yeah, so it’s really beautiful to see the messages that are being — like I said, I’ve been stalking you on YouTube Cameran — but it seems like you have a really clear message of really wanting people to really be who they are, and not apologize. Can you expound on that a little bit?
CF: I think from the beginning of my film career, the reason I got into film is cuz my dad makes movies. But I never, I don’t know, that was always who I looked up to. But I never really was around women who made film for a very long time. Until Ava. Ava was the first female person who I ever collaborated with, and that just made such a difference for me I think in my entire film career. The first films I ever made were at a film camp where I was the only girl out of 12 guys.
HSV: Wow!
CF: I went to Vermont for 3 weeks and I was the only female person there. And that was crazy for me.
HSV: That is crazy.
CF: That was how I started making stuff, and it was just like, “This is not what I want. This is not what I want my career to be. I don’t want to be surrounded by men. I don’t want to have this huge male influence affecting what I created. And so I think ever since then and then after working with Ava, and now at film school. And, of course, there’s actually more women in my film program, which is actually really cool.
HSV: That’s super cool.
CF: I just want everything I make to be so sincerely me, and colorful and sparkly and, I guess feminine, but just magical energy, magical feminine powerful energy in everything I create from now on because I just want to attract other female filmmakers and people like me who want to steer away from the, I guess like — not male influence, but that’s all I had when I started making films. And I want to encourage other women that we don’t have to start out like that. That you can start with this magicalness. [smiles]
HSV: How old were you when you very first picked up a camera, or a phone, I guess? Did you start with a phone camera or did you start with an actual camera camera?
CF: I actually started with a camera camera, and now I film everything on my phone.
HSV: How did you film The Queen’s Closet?
CF: The Queen’s Closet was on both. Death of a Unicorn was on my phone. I just want to focus on the way — I don’t know, I’m not good at cameras yet.
HSV: I disagree! [laughter]
So how old, if you don’t mind I ask, how old was that, when you said, “my film career” but you’re only 18, which is amazing! Badass!
CF: [laughs] I was actually going through my camera roll the other day and I made this 8-minute silent horror film when I was in 6th grade with my neighbor that I completely forgot about. I’ve always been making art, I’ve always been making little movies. But the first film I made was in 8th grade and it was a documentary about fast fashion, and it was totally random. And then I started making short, instagram edits and taking videos from my camera roll and putting them into little things. I actually have an instagram edit of the Haight from my freshman year. And then I guess when everyone starts talking about college, like what do you want to do in college, what’s your career, what’s your future? I was like, okay maybe I should start actually thinking about this and actually working with other people. And then not this month but the month before is when I went to Vermont and did the film program with all the guys and started to actually make real narrative film.
HSV: Right. Gotcha. Wow.
And how about you, Ava? What was your first foray into the biz?
AW: I mean, from a film standpoint, the program at school. I had never been exposed to any kind of film. I actually considered myself to be pretty bad at the technology and film and photography and all that. But honestly, working with Cam, I think Cam had a very clear preconceived thought of what I thought film was and what kind of person you had to be in order to do that kind of stuff. And I just never approached it because I didn’t feel like I fit in that box.
I think both of us together grew a lot making that documentary because we realized that we could make our own creative choices and do whatever we wanted in art and in film, like it could go hand in hand, and it did’t need to be one way or another — even if we were being told other things by people around us. I don’t think film is my path right now, that’s not where I’m headed it’s still something that I love and I do. And art IS what I’m going to do. I’m going to do city art, visual art, and I wouldn’t have been okay with exploring that path if I had not kind of let go of the perspective of things that was being shoved on me, you know, by society, by the people around me, by what’s expected living in this area and living as a woman.
HSV: That actually leads to, just listening to you talk, that’s kind of this whole edition of the magazine, again, for a woman … this isn’t like a feminist edition. Guys are awesome too, and guys are learning to embrace the feminine too within themselves and be cool, like, let the ladies lead! Cool! Let us drive for awhile, guys, that kind of thing. And those kind of guys are the cool guys.
But as far as thew whole thing about being afraid to shine or intimidated to shine because number one, you don’t want to piss anybody off, number two, you don’t want all the attention — all that sort of trying to dim ourselves down. Could you speak briefly about that, either of you? Is there anything you have to say about that?
CF: Do you want to go first, Ava?
AW: Yeah, sure. I just feel like there’s a lot of pressure on everybody to be a certain way, do a certain thing. And that can be a variety of different things. It’s not necessarily one thing or another, but everybody needs to be successful, and people are scared because you don’t want to not do that. You don’t want to not be successful, and you don’t want to not reach your full potential, and you don’t want to disappoint people around you, and you don’t want to disappoint yourself. Which ultimately stops you from doing the things you want to do. To suppress any part of yourself makes it impossible to explore the entirety of yourself. And I think letting go of that is something that everybody can do.
I mean for me personally, I would not have been able to make this documentary if I had not let go of my apprehensions about making a film, about presenting it, about going places with it because it was something that I didn’t think I could do and that I didn’t think I could be good at, and I didn’t think we could go anywhere with it. But the moment I let that go and Cam let that go and we all just decided to have fun with it and do what we could, it just turned into something that was really representative of ourselves and of what we were trying to accomplish.
HSV: That’s awesome. Well spoken!
AW: Thank you.
CF: Yeah, I think Ava and I both had a moment together when we were making The Queen’s Closet, I think it was after the Uti interview, and we didn’t really get the historical side that we were looking for in that interview, it was more of a personal … it just was different than what we thought. And we both kind of looking at each other and we were like, “Okay, we did not get …
We asked questions that we wanted to have in the documentary from what our teachers wanted us to have, and I think we both realized, “Okay, this documentary is special. We’re proud of what we’re making so far. We’re just gonna make this documentary what we want it to be. We’re just gonna take this as artsy and important to us, and we’re just not gonna focus on the prompt, we’re not gonna focus on what the teachers want, we’re just gonna make this for us. And I think that really changed the course of the documentary. And we got a bad grade … [laughter] but also, we got this opportunity. We’re doing this interview [with you] now. We made something we’re proud of. I love sharing this documentary with people. I love that I have my name of this and I did this with Ava.
It doesn’t matter that we got a bad grade. This is so much more than that and I think … I’m so glad that we worked together on this cuz without Ava we would not have been able to create something that’s more than just a school assignment. I don’t think of this documentary as a school assignment. I think of this as a very special project I had with Ava and with Blake and Uti and Andrew and everyone that we did this.
HSV: It’s a beautiful … what’s the word I’m looking for … like, you guys being on the young side and the whole queer thing and drag dressing and — freedom to express who you are! And then Uti, who’s just amazing! She’s been there for 45 years! She’s so cool. So it’s just a really beautiful hybrid — hybrid’s not the right word, but nice mix of youth and wisdom and beauty. And it’s just wonderfully shot.
Let’s see, where do I go from there? Oh, I was going to say while you were speaking Cameran: Have you guys had to do, you know, now that you’ve won the award, are you having to meet-and-greets, junkets at all that?
CF: Oh I wish we were that special!
HSV: Your media tour or whatever!? Is this your first media tour?
CF: [laughter] This is our first media experience for The Queen’s Closet, and my first media experience ever!
HSV: Yay! You’re doing great! You guys are acting like professionals. I mean I don’t even know what I’m doing and I’ve been doing it for a long time! I went to SF State in the ‘80s and I still don’t really know what I’m doing! You know, you just keep going and it seems to be working, it seems like the way to go!
CF: [laughter] Yeah!
HSV: You know what I mean? Yeah, I’m glad I brought that up.
Okay, so, what do I have left? Season of the Witch … what’s your intuitive response to the work “witch”? Does it make you feel like it’s a bad word, I think it scares guys … what’s your response to the word “witch”?
CF: It makes me excited! [laughter] It makes me feel like I have this feminine, witchy, powerful side inside of me and I get to unleash it! And I don’t really understand it yet but it’s forming inside of me.
AW: Yeah, me and Cam, we love this stuff! We really do! And it’s funny: our art is all whimsical and weird and fun. And The Queen’s Closet was the same. We’re both very much into that kind of stuff. It just fun for us!
HSV: Yeah, cool. And my girlfriend who’s writing an article in this edition, we’ve been researching goddesses and we’ve been more and more amazed by the relationships: like the Egyptian goddesses had the cats, Sekhmet hat the lion’s head, and just that empowerment.
These were goddesses! And those powerful women were burned at the stake, you know, eventually, metaphorically. The whole metaphor of the whole journey of the divine feminine, it’s pretty intense. So to be a witch, you do have to be pretty intense. There was Glinda the Good Witch, you don’t have to be a good 2 shoes — this is my own personal opinion. For this edition I’ve been doing my homework and exploring the idea: the woman, the witch, the goddess, the prostitute — there are all these layers of femininity. And I just think it’s beautiful that you guys have made this film, and it’s so not about your own thing, it’s just this beautiful take on that struggle, of expression, on masculine/feminine, on oppression, on all of that stuff …
That wasn’t really a question [laughter]. Do you have anything to say about goddesses, or witches, or whatever?
CF: Well, I was very curious when you said Season of the Witch in the email, so I ended up watching this really random documentary about witchcraft in some country that is not America [laughter] I don’t remember specifically. But there’s this family of witches there that are revered for being for being the most powerful women in the world there, and I just thought that was cool. I didn’t know that that was happening. And so now I’m just going to take this witchiness and keep learning about it because I’m so curious. [laughter]
HSV: Cool!
CF: But I’m really into unicorns, that’s like my thing right now [laughter], as if you can’t tell from Death of a Unicorn! And I have this book right now right behind me. I’m learning about unicorns and femininity and stuff like that. I just love mystical stuff like that!
HSV: What’s the nutshell, the one-liner, about what a unicorn is?
CF: I don’t know yet! I do not know. But I have this — here, I’ll show you. It’s really cool. [grabs a book: “UNICORN” by Beer]
HSV: Oooh!
CF: Yeah, it’s pretty magical! Yeah, I haven’t really gotten into it yet but I’m very excited about it.
HSV: Well you’ve got to come back to the Haight because my girlfriend, Sunshine Powers — hi Sunshine! Say hey to Sunny! — she owns Love on Haight on the corner, the tie-dye store?
CF: Yeah!
HSV: She’s such an amazing woman. She’s like the queen of Haight Street, she’s been here forever. I’m more like the ambassador cuz I talk to everybody, but she’s more queen of the unicorns. She’ll all about unicorns and she’s … doesn’t matter how old you are. It’s the magical, the colorful, be magical, have a magical day, all of that, which I think is … well, to bring it back to the Haight Street Voice: Do you feel like there’s a special energy here? What’s your take on that?
CF: I have one thing to say about that store: I went there once about 2 years ago and … I think I have it [looks around desk, holds up a large green crystal to camera] and I was taking pictures through this. And I don’t know who it was it was so long ago but the person there let me keep this! And I have this in my film bag and I actually filmed a shot through it in Death of a Unicorn …
AW: And Queen’s Closet!
CF: …and the opening shot in Queen’s Closet! Yeah! We used this in the transitions! This crystal has shaped part of my personal cinematography style and it’s amazing it came from that store!
HSV: That’s wild! See if you had never made this movie … that’s synchronicity, y’all!
CF: Yeah!
HSV: I think that’s our witchy powers coming to light
CF: Definitely!
AW: I think Haight Street is very magical! People don’t realize how influential the Haight and the Castro and all that was to San Francisco as a whole, and the kind of people that are here. There was a reason we were drawn to make that film. We started with nothing, with no direction, with no idea of what we wanted, and all it took was to walk into Piedmont and onto the Haight and to talk to someone there to decide that’s what we wanted to do, and to throw our grade out the window and not care about who was watching our film and how it would be perceived or whatever. It was something we needed to do for ourselves.
The idea of expression and the idea of just embracing your true self and exploring all aspects of yourself was something that me and Cam were both going through personally. It was something that we needed to do for ourselves, regardless external reason of why we were doing this film. And the Haight drew that out! People are so open, so wanting to express themselves, and to have everyone around them express themselves, and it’s just a very judgment-free place. And it was the perfect place for us to explore those things.
HSV: That’s so awesome to hear. Well [laughter], thank you school system for “forcing” these girls to go explore the world and get a bad grade! [thumbs up; laughter]
Okay. What else. Oh in my notes: Cameran, your use of music is totally excellent. Like I’ve already downloaded … I Shazam’d a bunch of your stuff!
CF: Oh my gosh!
HSV: Where do you get most of your musical inspiration? Is it like, “I want this kind of music for that …” or is it like the song drives the visual for you? How does that work?
CF: For Death of a Unicorn, since that’s just the last thing I made, I only used this one artist named Devi McCallion and I have always just loved her music, and when I was thinking about the film I was writing the script for this film I was just listening to that music and it all just kind of came together.
HSV: Cats Millionaire [name of album]
CF: Yeah, that entire album that I used is songs about My Little Pony, which is so silly and fun. I just loved all that music.
HSV: Is Cats Millionaire new? I’m old and have no idea!
CF: I could talk about this for hours! I’m obsessed. [laughs] Cats Millionaire is a small project and that artist has 13 other musical endeavors. Some of them have millions of monthly listeners. She does everything: she makes a bunch of stuff. Her name is Devi McCallion, and I always look at her stuff when making stuff cuz she has such a wide range of music.
HSV: Wow. Shoutout to her! Maybe you’ll be working with her in the near future!
CF: Oooh!
HSV: C’mon, we’re witches, we can make it happen, we can invoke it!
Okay and that kind of leads into 2 closing statements: the Cats Millionaire had a song “Humans Are Terrifying”, I love that! That song is brilliant! Humans ARE terrifying. I mean, the planet [rolling eyes] whatever’s going on out there, whoa. I feel so badly for you guys and I love to see that you’re creating art instead of just like playing video games or wigging out about how f’d up the world is — or messed up, sorry parents! Your parents are not gonna like me cursing! [laughter]. You can edit it out! Hey Cam, I might hire you to edit all this out!
CF: I would! [laughter]
HSV: The Cats Millionaire and then — I really love seeing how things connect – and then it’s the Year of the Tiger and I happen to be Tiger, and then this whole research into goddesses and the whole relationship with the feline, Nefertiti, the cat goddess, and the panthers in the latino world and all that magicalness. You want magic? There it is right there! There’s not really a question there. [laughter]
I guess if you were gonna roar — let’s make this a corny segue — but if you were gonna roar to the world … actually start with the Haight: What would you like say to the Haight community, or roar or meow or whatever? And then, because Haight Street Voice is “hyper-local with a global perspective” so it’s not just about this community it’s about community everywhere, say hello to you neighbor, say hello to the mail lady … That’s where it’s going to get better in this world I think. So what would you like to say to the Haight first, and then just basically to the world in general?
[laughter]
It’s a big question!
CF: That’s a big question!
HSV: You could just say “hi”!
CF: Ava do you have something in mind?
AW: I love the Haight, I love what the Haight does, it’s just craziness in a nutshell. Nowhere is like the Haight. People who live on the Haight, live in San Francisco forget that nowhere else is like that. People are not like people on the Haight. It’s just special, you know? And everyone can feel special on the Haight. That’s why people come to visit. That’s why it’s such an influential kind of a point on the map in San Francisco. Everyone wants to go to the Haight because of the energy. Yes, there’s cool shops, yes, there’s fun things to do, but it really is the people and the community there. And I guess the reason for that is because people are creative and because people are choosing to be happy rather than fall into the traps of being unhappy for various reasons and various external pressures and expectations. And that’s something everybody can learn from.
HSV: And this is your art right behind me [beautiful painting of cartoon girl warrioress]
AW: Yeah!
HSV: It’s beautiful! And that’s part of how you keep your creativity and your positivity alive obviously, right?
AW: Yeah! I mean, art is so important to me. It’s expression. It’s my way of communicating whatever is going on in my head. And it’s just fun. It’s a way of processing and healing and doing what you can to be happy and to find something that you love and that you can do.
HSV: Thank you! That was beautiful spoken.
CF: Yay Ava!
Okay, what do I have to say?
HSV: [pull up Cameran’s painting of weird doll octopus thing] Here’s yours! [laughter]
AW: We love Camp Art?
CF: This is why Ava and I are different! [laughter]
HSV: I love it! This is kind of why tried to bring up your art. I love it!
CF: I think what I have to say to the Haight and why I think the Haight is so special and also what I learned from making the documentary especially, is that the more you surround yourself, for me particularly, the more I surround myself with people that make me feel creative and inspired and just color and sparkles, just happy, magical energy, the more I’m able to bring that on to other people and the more inspired I am to make art and to share my art and to learn, and to teach other people. And I think the Haight is so special because you can do all of that there. You go to the Haight and you just feel all of that energy that I was just explaining. I always leave the Haight with a million pictures on my phone, a million things I want to recreated, a million things I want to draw and pull from, and people I want to talk to and places I want to go back to and I want to bring my friends and my family there. I just love it.
HSV: Yay! The Haight-Ashbury loves you too, guys! [laughter] Next time you come hang out we’ll take you out to lunch.
CF: Awww.
HSV: You have come get the magazine. We’ll have to talk about that because you guys are gonna have to let me know what images you want to use. There’s not a lot of room in the magazine, but they’ll go on the website too, but we’ll figure out what images we want to use for The Queen’s Closet. Images that kind of bridge the two (Haight and drag)
I guess that’s it. Thanks for being here.
AW: Thanks for having us!
HSV: Yeah! I really appreciate everything you guys are doing. It’s so inspiring, and thank you for being creative because this never would’ve happened. And again, thank you to the school system for driving you to the Haight Ashbury!
CF: I just think it’s so exciting and incredible that Ava and I made something and now people are watching it and they want to hear us talk about it.
AW: And loving it, yeah!
CF: This is the most rewarding experience. I never thought I would ever make anything that people were interested in — especially in high school. So this is just like such a magical experience.
AW: We love art. Art is our life, it’s what we want to do, it’s what we want everyone in the whole world to do. Why would you not? It’s always been personal for both of us. I think both of us when we made this film and came together, art was something we did on the side. It was something we defined our identity with but was still not necessarily our connection to the outside world. Through making this film, it made it really clear that that is something we can do and it is something that other people can appreciate, and it’s a community that we can insert ourselves in and find a lot of family inside of and build a life around it. It’s very exciting and very rewarding.
HSV: It breaks all the boundaries too.
BOTH: Yeah!
HSV: Black, white, gay, not gay, rich, poor — all of that stuff, which I think is probably the most beautiful thing about art. Little kids being free to express themselves, keep that energy going, that magical energy we all have, like you were taking about, Cameran. Keeping that magic alive. So thank you for keeping the magic alive! [laughter]
Peace you guys! We’ll see you again, okay?
BOTH: Yes!
AW: I mean, I’ll be back! I still have a year of high school. I still have documentaries to make! The Haight I will definitely revisit!
HSV: You’re gonna have come get the magazine. Come to the City, pick up the magazine and we’ll see you then in person!
AW: Yeah! I love that! Awesome. Thank you so much!
HSV: Thank YOU so much! It’s been great.
