TORONTO.- The Institute for Contemporary Culture (ICC) at the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) presents American filmmaker Robert Adanto’s directorial debut, The Rising Tide at 7:30 pm on Thursday, August 21, 2008 in the ROM’s Signy & Cléophée Eaton Theatre. The Rising Tide (2008) explores China’s transformation through the work and words of several of the country’s leading young artists, photographers and filmmakers. The director will be in attendance to introduce his film and take questions from the audience.

"I spent nearly three years completing this project, and it has truly been a labour of love,” explains Mr. Adanto. “I find sharing it with the public most gratifying, so I thank the ICC for the opportunity to screen The Rising Tide at the ROM."

Filmed in China, a country that has one of the most vital, imaginative, and uncontainable art scenes in the world, The Rising Tide (2008) presents the work of artists Cao Fei, Xu Zhen, Yang Yong, Wang Qingsong, Chen Qiulin, Birdhead, and Zhang O. Through their work, mainly in photography and video, the film
examines the collision between the present and the future, and the confusion and ambiguity that characterize the new China. Within the dual context of globalization and urbanization, these thoughtful young artists attempt to deal with the dynamic forces transforming China. The Rising Tide captures this momentous time in China's history while exploring the work of artists who comment with intelligence, wit, foreboding and nostalgia. For more information and the film’s trailer, visit: www.therisingtidefilm.com.

The Rising Tide is the directorial debut for Los Angeles-based independent documentary filmmaker Robert Adanto. Since 1995, Mr. Adanto has taught interdisciplinary humanities at Crossroads School for Arts and Sciences in Santa Monica, CA, as well as a course dedicated to his literary mentor, William Shakespeare. In 2007, Mr. Adanto was the recipient of the National Association for Independent Schools' Leading Edge Award for Global Sustainability, for the AIDS education and activism program he founded in 2006, the Crossroads Teen AIDS Ambadors. He is currently working on two other documentary projects: a short film
set in Kibera, one of the largest slums in Nairobi, Kenya, and a second project that will take him to Tehran, Iran, in December, 2008.

The film will also be on view at the following locations:

Saturday, 8/23: Worcester Art Museum, Mass
Friday, 9/19: Bates College Museum of Art, Lewiston, Maine
Thursday, 10/03: UCR Sweeney Art Gallery
Friday, 10/3: Pacific Asia Museum, Pasadena, CA
Wednesday, 10/22: The Patricia & Phillip Frost Art Museum, Miami (Thursday, 11/13: The Smithsonian's Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C.

Tickets, available on day of event beginning at 6 pm at the Loblaws Entrance (south entrance), are: General Public, $10; ROM Members, $8; Friends of the ICC, $6. For more information, visit www.rom.on.ca/icc. This event is organized in conjunction with the ICC exhibition, Shanghai Kaleidoscope, presented by Manulife Financial, on display until Nov. 2, 2008.