![\"IMG_1240\"](\"http:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/allin\/files\/2014\/09\/IMG_1240.jpg\")
<\/a>A small crowd watches a series of short independent films at 30 City in Plattsburgh on Friday, September 5th. According to Jason Torrance (right), this event is not necessarily “hip.”<\/p><\/div>\n
Technically, I\u2019m not new to the region. I lived in the Champlain Valley, in Burlington, for almost five years before coming to NCPR (four years as an undergrad at UVM, and then for less than a year post-graduation). However, as anyone in any North Country town will readily inform you, Burlington is nothing like New York\u2019s North Country. This is absolutely true. That\u2019s partly why I was stationed in Canton for the past year – to get the feel for place. During that time I reported from our main offices, and also from Potsdam, Ogdensburg, Morristown, Wanakena, Gouverneur, Saranac Lake, and other towns.<\/p>\n
Plattsburgh is a different ballgame. It\u2019s an urban scene, but unlike Watertown, Glens Falls, or Burlington, the attitude is totally unique.<\/p>\n
Of course I\u2019m generalizing, and I can\u2019t totally put my finger on it yet. Part of this different ballgame is that among my own age group (the twenty- and thirty-somethings), there\u2019s an unusual, offbeat cultural scene. Young grownups here are making music, films, paintings, and other art forms that intentionally subvert the mainstream. But people, as far as I can tell, are not really participating in the larger trend of \u201chipsterdom\u201d – or \u201chipsterism,\u201d as my recent acquaintance Jason Torrance says.<\/p>\n
Jason is an adjunct English lecturer at SUNY Plattsburgh and a filmmaker. He\u2019s one of the organizers for Plattsburgh\u2019s upcoming Lake Champlain International Film Festival, which has received submissions of indie flicks from Japan, Canada, Poland, Austria, Australia, and Germany. During an interview about that festival, I asked, \u201cIs Plattsburgh hip?\u201d His response:<\/p>\n
\n\u201c…Plattsburgh is a very earnest place… I hate the term \u2018hipster,\u2019 even though me and most of my friends could probably be classified as them. But the thing about Plattsburgh is, you can indulge in hispterism. You can find things hip around here. But what we have over hipsters in other locales, is we can still be earnest about things – and forthright, and romantic, and expressionistic about things, and not fall prey to that kind of hipster irony of not finding joy in anything. We may have twenty- and thirty-somethings with big crazy beards, but they\u2019re also passionate people who are, once again to use that term, earnest.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
From what I can tell so far, that is an accurate assessment. The artistic people I\u2019ve met have have been welcoming, warm, and unpretentious. To be sure, they are cool – but also nonjudgmental, open to nuance, and genuinely psyched that NCPR now has a full-time Plattsburgh-based reporter. I think I can work with that enthusiasm.<\/p>\n
Hilariously, Jason adds,<\/p>\n
\u201cWe got a pretty wonderful parfait of honesty and hipness, I guess. So grab a spoon.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Grab a spoon!<\/p>\n