Inaugural MADE Project: OTV | Open Television
Co-founders: Elijah McKinnon, OTV Executive Director
Seed Phase: 2014-2019
Capacity Building Phase: 2020-present
Capacity Gardeners: Surdna Foundation, MacArthur Foundation, Pop Culture Collaborative, Field Foundation
The first Media and Data Equity Project experimented with alternative ways to develop and distribute television through the lens of intersectionality.
Can we use the internet to imagine TV channels that represent communities that have been historically marginalized? Historically, intersectionality is incompatible with media distributors’ impulse to segregate communities into target markets (BET for Black people, Lifetime for women, El Rey for Latinx communities, Logo for gay people, etc.). But internet distribution has increased stories about Black women or Latinx gays.
OTV co-founders Elijah McKinnon & AJ
Incubated at Northwestern for five years before receiving its first general operating grant, OTV started as Open TV beta, a platform for artists producing short-form pilots, series, film and video art in the city of Chicago. In those five years, MADE Lab Director AJ Christian and OTV co-founder Elijah McKinnon developed over 70 original video projects, hosted over 50 screenings in Chicago, and inspired over 1 million impressions on these original diverse art works. OTV programs eventually received recognition from the Television Academy (Emmy Awards), Webby Awards, Streamy Awards, Gotham Awards, among others. Its programming partners included the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, the Sundance Institute, and the city of Chicago, along with numerous galleries, community organizations, and universities across the United States and globally. Artists supported by OTV received offers to adapt their indie series to longer form series from leading studios and distributors, including HBO, CBS, Lionsgate and Hulu.
From 2015-2020 while leading OTV’s transition from experiment to independent non-profit, Dr. Christian and Executive Director McKinnon raised over $1 million in multi-year support to sustain its operations. The OTV project secured commitments from the MacArthur Foundation, Surdna Foundation, Field Foundation, Pop Culture Collaborative and Cinereach, allowing it to begin capacity building.
In 2020, Elijah McKinnon formally took over leadership over OTV as its first Executive Director. In 2021, OTV hired its first full-time staff, Head of Artist Development & Production Sarah Minnie and Head of Marketing & Exhibition Chris Walker.
Website: http://weareo.tv
Research reports: http://weareo.tv/research
Organization reports: http://weareo.tv/development
Ongoing engagement:
Organizational Development – As the organization builds capacity for its own fundraising staff, MADE Lab director contributes grant writing support for the organization as a board member.
Diversity Databases - In partnership with the Sundance Institute & OTV, Made Lab explores the rise of databases for women and people in film/TV.