Filmmakers

James Blaine Dunlap was born in 1953 and grew up in the Oak Cliff section of Dallas, Texas. His mother was a public librarian, and he began making Super 8 films while still in grade school. He later attended the Meadows School of the Arts at Southern Methodist University, where he studied documentary filmmaking with Stephen Schmidt.

One of his important early films was Sometimes I Run (1973), a remarkably intimate portrait of Stanley Maupin, a Dallas sanitation worker who cleaned city sidewalks at night. Dunlap made the film while he was a student at SMU.

In 1974 Dunlap attended the Sinking Creek Film Celebration in Nashville and subsequently moved to Tennessee. There he began a long collaboration with filmmaker Sol Korine, using the newly available portable video technology to document Southern traditional culture and music. Their work was pioneering in the use of portable video for independent documentary production.

Among their films were Showdown at the Hoedown (1976), documenting the Fiddlers' Jamboree; Hamper McBee: Raw Mash (1978), an extraordinary portrait of Tennessee ballad singer, storyteller, and moonshiner Hamper McBee; Uncle Dave Macon (1980), about the legendary Grand Ole Opry performer; and Mouth Music (1981), an exploration of Southern vocal traditions ranging from hollering and auctioneering to children's rhymes and "eephing."

Dunlap later moved to New Orleans, where an important part of his work shifted from filmmaking to film and videotape preservation through the Southeast Media Preservation Lab. Tragically, Hurricane Katrina destroyed his original film elements for Sometimes I Run; two 16mm prints were subsequently located in the South Carolina Arts Commission collection.