MAPLE SUMMIT FILM FESTIVAL
Annual Film Festival
Presenting Awards for MicroShorts
Narrative Shorts, Narrative Features,
and Documentaries
Where Creativity is Inspired and Nurtured
Maple Summit Film Festival
Not far from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in Fayette County, overlooking the Youghiogheny River Valley is Maple Summit - a rural community known not only for adventurous outdoor activities, but for having inspired and nurtured some of the world's most influential artists: Frank Lloyd Wright was inspired to design both Fallingwater and Kentuck Knob here; documentary filmmaker and co-producer of The Beatle's Let It Be Saul Swimmer, 1940's radio and stage personality Rhoda Chase (aka "The Blue Velvet Voice"), and three-time Edgar Allan Poe Award-winning mystery writer John Dickson Carr were all raised in nearby Uniontown; film pioneer and director of The Great Train Robbery Edwin S. Porter was raised in Connellsville; and the father of Pop Art, Andy Warhol, was born and raised in nearby Charleroi.
This gem of the Appalachians has also played - and continues to play host to renowned international artists. From those invited to summer with the influential Kaufmann family at Bear Run in the 1920-60s to the artists supported by the Hardy family - the owners of 84 Lumber, and now the artist in residency programs at Fallingwater. Craftsmen and women from around the world come to teach workshops at the Touchstone Center.
Maple Summit Film Festival was founded to celebrate not only the natural beauty of the Laurel Highlands, but also the area's long history of creative inspiration and nurturing.
