This week for our SAIC student writing series Natalia De Orellana grapples with Massimo Sarchielli and Alberto Grifi’s Anna. She finds herself invested in the directors’ ethics, yet rebuffed by their use of their camera. “We preferred,” explained Grifi, “a movie about reality rather than undertaking the struggle to create a slightly less revolting reality.” Anna | Thursday, April 2nd | Introduced […]
Read More… from When Art Reveals Unspeakable Social Reality: Recalling Anna
Thursday, April 2nd | Introduced by Dennis Lim, Director of Programming at the Film Society of Lincoln Center Recently restored by the Cineteca di Bologna, this astonishing 1975 documentary centers on the titular pregnant, homeless 16-year-old girl whom filmmakers Alberto Grifi and Massimo Sarchielli encountered in Rome’s Piazza Navona. Mainly shot on then-newfangled video, it documents […]
An acrobat flies through the darkened hall, followed by two circles of light and a haunting soprano voice. The acrobat seemingly divides into two bodies that intertwine with each other as the music builds to a crescendo. Suddenly, one of the acrobats falls, we hear a startled gasp from the camerawoman, and the footage switches. […]
Thursday, March 26th | Soon Mi-Yoo in person! South Korea–born and Cambridge-based artist Soon-Mi Yoo’s debut feature is a nuanced look at political ideology and everyday life in North Korea. Winner of the prestigious Golden Leopard for Best First Feature at the 2014 Locarno Film Festival, the film interweaves biography (Yoo’s father fought in the war and […]
Alexander Stewart takes a moment to write about the upcoming program Encounters: Experimental Film and Animation from Croatia for the CATE blog. Encounters, screening Thursday (12th) and Saturday (14th) of this week, explores the rich history of Croatian film and animation. This intensively researched program reveals the unique history of Croatian avant-garde cinema–a history that runs in parallel to […]
Thursday, March 12th & Saturday, March 14th | Introduced by Alexander Stewart, filmmaker, curator, and Assistant Professor at DePaul University Zagreb, Croatia has long been an important hub for animation, experimental film, and avant-garde culture. Informed by unique cultural, intellectual, and political legacies, filmmakers there have produced decades of strong, challenging, and fascinating experimental work. Filmmaker Alexander […]
Read More… from Mar 12 & 14 – Encounters: Experimental Film and Animation from Croatia
This week in our SAIC Student Writing series Matthew Coleman (MA Art History 2015) blogs on John Gerrard’s large-scale digital works. He looks at the way Gerrard reveals the artificial natures of linear time and knowledge progression by bringing into question the provisional structures of power and networks of energy that facilitate our everyday existence. John […]
Thursday, March 5th | John Gerrard in person! The works of John Gerrard (MFA 2000) often take shape as large-scale projections of meticulously crafted virtual worlds, astonishing in their scope and execution. Driven by sophisticated military modeling and video game software, they recreate the outposts of human industry—a 19th-century paper mill in Norway, mysterious roadways along China’s […]
I am delighted to welcome back Lindsay Bosch, Marketing & Development Manager of Video Data Bank, who this week writes on the lyrical work of Rebecca Baron. Founded at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1976 at the inception of the media arts movement, the Video Data Bank is a leading resource in […]
Thursday, February 26th | Rebecca Baron in person! Los Angeles–based filmmaker Rebecca Baron is known for provocative essay films exploring such far-ranging subjects as Britain’s Mass Observation movement, 19th-century Arctic exploration, and the role of recording technologies in shaping our understanding of the world around us. Her latest film,Detour de Force, introduces viewers to the incredible […]