Brooklyn's Northside Festival Runs Now thru June 21

Now in its fourth year, the Northside Festival (June 14-21, www.northsidefestival.com), Brooklyn's preeminent music and emerging culture festival, showcases the next generation of artists, innovators and problem-solvers, all within the walkable radius of Williamsburg and Greenpoint. Today's announcement was made at the Brooklyn Borough Hall Rotunda by Northside Media Group CEO Scott Stedman and President Daniel Stedman, Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz, and Brooklyn-born special guest GZA, founding member of legendary NYC rap group Wu-Tang Clan.

Blending Brooklyn's roots with the nation's future, Northside is an eight-day showcase of bands, films and art, and new this year, entrepreneurship. Northside Entrepreneurship will feature a mixture of established business leaders and the next generation of innovators, combined with a trade show floor showcasing the latest technology from NYC's most exciting startups. The presentations, panels and interactive experiences at the event are designed to provide aspiring entrepreneurs, marketers and investors with the opportunity to personally learn from and interact with the city's most innovative businesses and creative minds. Yes, Northside Entrepreneurship will transform a 40,000 sq. ft. factory in Williamsburg, Brooklyn into a conference center, which will play host to more than 40 panel discussions on topics such as design, software, development, music and social cinema.

"New York City, and Brooklyn specifically, is the epicenter of a new entrepreneurship economy," said Northside Media Group CEO Scott Stedman. "Brooklyn has become an adjective for 'what's next', and Northside Festival defines and showcases that adjective for a regional and national audiencE. Northside is an ever-growing, beautiful beast of a Festival, and Northside Entrepreneurship is the first major conference to specifically explore the next generation of innovators and the problems they're solving."

Additional information about the festival will be announced. Check out our website at www.northsidefestival.com to sign up for e-mail updates, and follow @NorthsideFest on Twitter for all the latest.

NORTHSIDE MUSIC (June 14 – 17)

The music component of Northside continues to grow in exciting new ways. There will be over 350 bands performing at 25 venues in the walkable radius of the Williamsburg and Greenpoint neighborhoods. A small sampling of the artists that will take these stages include: of Montreal, Ceremony, Tinariwen, Starfucker, Kool Keith, The Felice Brothers, Dâm-Funk, Screaming Females and the Brooklyn-born founder of NYC's legendary rap group Wu-Tang Clan GZA, who will be performing his landmark album Liquid Swords, with backing from Grammy-winning Latin funk orchestra Grupo Fantasma.

These bands will be a part of more than 70 shows curated by the likes of: BrooklynVegan, Sacred Bones, Kanine Records, Fun Fun Fun Fest, Terrorbird Media, Academy Annex, Neon Marshmallow festival, NYCTaper, Chaos in Tejas, VICE/Noisey, and many, many more of the local and national music community's most reliable tastemakers.

One particularly exciting development this year is the addition of Williamsburg Park, a 7,000-capacity space at 50 Kent Avenue between North 11th and North 12th Streets that will host multiple Northside shows.

NORTHSIDE ART (June 15 – 17)

Northside Art serves to create a collaborative platform for artists through exhibitions, performances, panels, and our signature open studios.

This year Northside Art looks forward to hosting a group exhibition that reflects the local art community and the synergy between artists' works and practices. The opening night of Northside Art will launch with an exhibition opening on Friday, June 15 and will be on view through Sunday, June 17.

There's an open call for artists submissions and the deadline is May 7. Submit at http://northsideart.wufoo.com/forms/northside-art-open-call-for-artists/.

Additionally, Northside Art will participate in Williamsburg Walks, a staple in supporting the local economy, on Saturday, June 16, featuring works from local artists with a focus on sculptures and interactive performances.

On Sunday, June 17 from (12pm – 6pm), Northside Art will host the annual Northside Open Studios with 100+ artists living and working in Williamsburg and Greenpoint opening their studios to the public to engage in conversation, education, collaboration and appreciation.

NORTHSIDE FILM (June 18 – 21)

Northside Film has grown into a four-day festival, featuring nearly 50 films, more than 25 curatorial partners, and the juried DIY Competition.

"We are creating a whole new model for a film festival, partnering with every important film organization in NYC and beyond and letting them curate their own screening program at Northside," said Daniel Stedman, President of Northside Media Group. "This format has worked for showcases at music festivals, and we're really excited to do it with our film festival."

Northside Film will now include Brooklyn Premieres, a series of films making their Brooklyn debut during the fest. We've got an exciting batch of titles, like: Brooklyn Brothers Beat the Best (Oscilloscope, co-presented by Rooftop Films), Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry (IFC Presentation), Take This Waltz (Magnolia Pictures by Sarah Polley, with Michelle Williams, Seth Rogen, Sarah Silverman, AaRon Abrams), Crazy Eyes (Strand Releasing) and The Dynamiter (Film Movement).

"We're are thrilled to celebrate this 'Do It Yourself' art form with our DIY Competition and an amazing panel of judges," added CEO Scott Stedman. "And with Social Cinema, we believe we are looking at the future of film distribution, and how films and screenings will be held and shared socially."

Following last year's debut of the Northside DIY Film Competition, judged by luminaries like actress Rosie Perez, DIY promoter Todd P and indie producer Ted Hope, we're hosting another competition for under-the-radar and industrious filmmakers! The feature and short will be screened together at a premiere engagement at the Nitehawk Cinema, followed by a party celebrating the filmmakers and their crew. Both films will also receive a redeemable certificate to be used on any DCTV service ranging from equipment rentals to their stellar post-production facilities and workshops. The open call for submissions has been specially extended until this upcoming Sunday, April 22, so make those final edits and enter today! Find out more by visiting www.northsidefestival.com and clicking Submit Your Film under the Film tab.

Northside Film is pleased to announce the inclusion of Flooding With Love For The Kid (dir. Zachary Oberzan) as this years' Northside DIY Film Competition Special Presentation, the out-of-competition screening highlighting an important DIY film. This 2007 adaptation of First Blood was made for $96 back in 2010 and features Oberzan in the role of every single character and shot in his 220-sq-ft Manhattan apartment. Oberzan will be in attendance for a Q&A after the screening.

Northside Film welcomes Nitehawk Cinema as a screening location, in addition to Williamsburg's indieScreen and the micro-cinema UnionDocs. With three screens and two in-house bars, the Nitehawk will bring their unique blend of art house cinema and Michelin-rated kitchen staff to the festival.

Northside Film Curatorial Partners include: IFC, indieWIRE, Rooftop Films, Magnolia Pictures Strand Releasing, Film Movement, Oscilloscope Pictures, Daily Motion, The L Magazine, Nitehawk, BAM, Cinetic, IFP, NewFest, Vice Magazine / Noisey, Film Sprout, dGenerate, Kings County Cinema Society, Third World Newsreel, Women Make Movies, Animation Block Party, Screen Slate, Hammer to Nail, Visit Films, NY African FilmFest, POV, Spectacle, Moviehouse, Cinema Tropical, Alt Screen, Film Wax and Orphans.

NORTHSIDE ENTREPRENEURSHIP (June 14 – 15)

Northside Entrepreneurship will shine a light on those companies and individuals building the most exciting products in five key areas: Innovation, Development, Design, Music Now Summit and Social Cinema. These people are changing the world and will be discussing why and how they are doing it. Working with programming partners Merrill Brown and Charlie O'Donnell, Northside Entrepreneurship showcases the future generation of business leaders as NYC takes its place as the next epicenter of innovation.

"New York City has emerged as a center of creative innovation in technology, and Brooklyn is home to many of the inspiring companies and individuals driving this entrepreneurial resurgence," said Charlie O'Donnell, Northside programming partner and CEO of Brooklyn Bridge Ventures. "I'm excited that Northside is showcasing the leaders behind companies like Makerbot, Codeacademy, Skillshare, Etsy, Boxee and scores of others in a format that will emphasize for our audience truly actionable takeaways, detailed lessons learned, and impactful advice."

Sponsored by Bloomberg BusinessWeek and AT&T, Northside Entrepreneurship will transform a 40,000-square foot factory at 149 Kent Avenue into a conference and exhibition center that will host more than 40 panel discussions. Scheduled speakers include: Etsy CTO Kellan Elliot-McCrea, MakerBot's Bre Pettis, Boxee CEO Avner Ronen, PaidContent and Skift Founder Rafat Ali, Wu-Tang Founding Member GZA, Irrive Founder Steve Cohn, Venrock's David Pakman, Personal Democracy Forum's Andrew Rasiej, Spanfeller Group Founder Jim Spanfeller, MoveOn Founder Eli Pariser, Sonar CEO Brett Martin and more.

Another component of Northside Entrepreneurship, Music NOW Summit Presented by AT&T, features original talks about innovation and disruption in the music industry. Confirmed speakers include: Pavilion GroupCEO Dez Dickerson, ReverbNation's Howard Han and more.

Attendees who visit the exhibition space will have the chance to meet dozens of the emerging companies changing the face of New York City and beyond, like GoWatchIt, Pond5, Boxee, Voxy, Enterproid and more.

And be sure to check out our interactive, central meeting point The HÜB at Northside, a modern 50' x 35' inflatable structure that is wrapped with projections of real-time "Big Data" visualizations of social connections married to location and time, with environmental and contextual data feeds throughout the Festival. Programming inside will be unique to the HÜB and will feature never before seen interactive engagements that foster real world interactions. See more at www.thehubatnorthside.com.

There are five types of Northside Festival Badges: Music, Film, Entrepreneurship, Premium and VIP. Badges give you access to Festival events on a first-come, first-served basis. You'll also be able to walk into tons of local bars and restaurants that will be offering discounts to badge-holders on food and drinks (both the alcoholic and non-alcoholic variety). Info on those discounts will be provided in the Festival program guide that you'll receive when picking up your badge. You can buy badges at: www.northsidefestival.com/badges.