| Conversations at the Edge Spring 2011
Conversations at the Edge returns February 3 with a program of 1970s No Wave shorts by Irish filmmaker Vivienne Dick, kicking off a season of screenings, artist talks, and performances by some of the most compelling media artists working today. We hope you will be able to join us for these exciting events. Full schedule and program descriptions are below and at www.saic.edu/cateblog.
CATE is organized by the School of the Art Institute of Chicago's Department of Film, Video, New Media, and Animation in collaboration with the Gene Siskel Film Center and the Video Data Bank.
Programs take place Thursdays at 6:00 p.m. at the Gene Siskel Film Center (164 N. State St.) unless otherwise noted.
CATE is FREE to SAIC students with a valid student ID. Tickets are $10 General public, $5 Film Center members, $7 students, and $4 SAIC faculty and staff and Art Institute of Chicago staff. For more information, write cate@saic.edu. |
SPRING 2011 SCHEDULE - Mark Your Calendar! | |  She Had Her Gun Already (Vivienne Dick, 1978). Courtesy the artist and LUX, London.
| | Vivienne Dick: No Wave Films
Thursday, February 3, 6:00 p.m.
"The quintessential No Wave filmmaker." -J. Hoberman
One of the most important filmmakers to emerge from New York's seething No Wave scene, and currently enjoying a resurgence of interest in her work, Ireland-born Vivienne Dick created a series of Super-8 films in the late 1970s that balance stripped-down narratives with visceral and moody performances by artists and musicians like Lydia Lunch, Pat Place, Adele Bertei, and Ikue Mori. Writes Ed Halter in Artforum, "Obsessed with exhuming repressed traumas, voicing beaten-down identities, and generally meandering through a complex matrix of bad vibes, Dick's works...are unapologetically messy, subjective, and political—thereby proposing that so, too, is life." This evening's program features a collection of her No Wave films, including the small-gauge masterpieces, She Had Her Gun Already (1978) and Beauty Becomes the Beast (1979), among others. 1978-79, Vivienne Dick, USA, Super-8mm on PAL Digibeta video, ca. 80 mins.
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Destiny Manifesto (Martha Colburn, 2006). Courtesy the artist. | | The Wild Triumphs of Martha Colburn
Thursday, February 10, 6:00 p.m.
Martha Colburn in person!
Martha Colburn's wickedly witty animations are assemblages of stop-motion puppetry, multi-layered glass painting, and all forms of pop cultural detritus. Drawing inspiration from the histories of the American West and more recent narratives of methamphetamine use and environmental catastrophe, Colburn's outrageous pastiches offer incendiary commentary on our contemporary condition. Writes Jonas Mekas: "Martha Colburn's films are naked testimonials of our times, and of her generation." This evening, she will present a range of works from across her oeuvre-including early favorites like Evil of Dracula (1997) and Cosmetic Emergency (2005)-and the Chicago premiere of two brand-new projects, in addition to an in-depth discussion about her process. 1994-2010, Martha Colburn, Netherlands/USA, multiple formats, ca. 75 mins plus discussion.
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Bouquets 1-10 (Rose Lowder, 1994-95). Courtesy the artist and Light Cone, Paris. | | Rose Lowder's Bouquets
Thursday, February 17, 6:00 p.m.
Rose Lowder in person!
Brimming with vibrant images of blossoms, orchards, insects, and grasses, the works of celebrated French filmmaker Rose Lowder literally buzz with life. For over thirty years, she has crafted a body of stunning structuralist portraits of the pastoral environs around her home in southern France. Often shot one frame at a time and composed through elaborate, pre-designed in-camera edits, each of her films also explores the possibilities of photographic and visual perception. Viewed together, they offer a dynamic investigation into the rhythms and cycles of the natural world. This evening, in her first-ever Chicago appearance, Lowder will present a selection of old and new works, including her on-going Bouquets series, each one-minute tributes to the flora and fauna she films. 1979-2010, Rose Lowder, France, 16mm, ca. 90 mins plus discussion.
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Criminal Case 40/61: Reverb (Andrea Geyer, 2009-10). Courtesy the artist. | | Andrea Geyer: Criminal Case
Thursday, February 24, 6:00 p.m.
Andrea Geyer in person!
In her striking, cerebral videos, installations, and photographs, German-born, New York-based artist Andrea Geyer mixes documentary and fiction to examine the ways historical narratives and social spaces shift over time and within larger socio-political contexts. Featured in tonight's program is Criminal Case 40/61: Reverb (2009–10), which reenacts the 1961-62 trial of notorious Nazi criminal Adolf Eichmann in Jerusalem. Based on both court transcripts and Hannah Arendt's book on the trial (Eichmann in Jerusalem: Report on the Banality of Evil ), Geyer's video abstracts the trial into six equally distinct roles—Accused, Defense, Judge, Prosecution, Reporter, and Audience—all performed by the same actor, artist (and SAIC alumnus) Wu Ingrid Tsang. Together, these fractions explore the trial's lasting relevance. Geyer, writes art historian Johanna Burton, "opens up whole pockets of forgotten history and, in so doing, remobilizes calcified, regulated understandings." 2009–10, Andrea Geyer, USA, HD Video, ca. 60 mins plus discussion.
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Posthumous (Posthume), Ghassan Salhab, 2007. Image courtesy the Video Data Bank. | | Radical Closure
Thursday, March 3, 6:00 p.m.
Curated by Lebanese video artist Akram Zaatari (who presented a program of his own works at CATE 2006), Radical Closure brings together documentaries, independent films, and video art from the Middle East and Europe produced in response to war, territorial conflicts, division, and political tension. Originally organized as an 11-part series for the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen in 2006, this ambitious and thought-provoking program has since been released as a DVD box set by the Video Data Bank. This evening's program celebrates the VDB release with a selection of works from the set portraying unsettling situations and a post-screening discussion with Zaatari via remote. Works include: I Soldier (Köken Ergun, 2005), Homage By Assassination (Elia Suleiman, 1992), Birthday Suit with Scars and Defects (Lisa Steele, 1974), Intensive Care (Hatice Güleryüz, 2001), The First Ones (Hatice Güleryüz, 2001), I've Heard Stories (Marwa Arsanios, 2008), and We Will Win (Mahmoud Hojeij, 2006). Co-presented by the Video Data Bank. 1974-2005, Canada/Lebanon/Palestine/Turkey, Beta SP video, ca. 70 mins plus discussion.
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Wall and Tower (Mur i Wieza), (Yael Bartana, RED HD Video, 2009, 15 min). Image courtesy Annet Gelink Gallery Amsterdam. | | Yael Bartana: A Declaration
Thursday, March 10, 6:00 p.m.
Yael Bartana in person!
Amsterdam—and Tel Aviv-based artist Yael Bartana's slippery, sophisticated films and videos reflect upon contemporary Israeli culture, the ideas and rituals that bind its citizens together, and its larger geopolitical context. Drawing upon ethnographic traditions, utopian Soviet-style propaganda, and historical reenactment, Bartana's work provocatively shuttles between irony and sincerity, playfulness and dead seriousness to examine the complex historical and political relations between Israel, Europe, the Middle East and beyond. Bartana will present an overview of her practice, including the first two installments of her latest project, The Polish Trilogy (Nightmares, 2007 and Wall and Tower 2009) and discuss her work on the third, which will premiere at this year's Venice Biennale. Additional works include Kings of the Hill (2003), Wild Seeds (2006), and A Declaration (2006), among others. Co-presented by SAIC's Visiting Artists Program . 2001–2010, Yael Bartana, Israel/Netherlands/Poland, multiple formats, ca. 75 mins plus discussion.
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The Disappointment (Brian Springer, 2007). Courtesy the artist. | | The Disappointment: Or, The Force of Credulity
Thursday, March 17, 6:00 p.m.
Brian Springer in person!
An unexpected masterpiece." — Grady Hendrix, New York Sun
Best known for his scathing news media exposé Spin (1995), Brian Springer's latest film is a labyrinthine, semi-autobiographical documentary about the search for four disparate treasures buried on his family's farm in Missouri. These include gold coins left behind by a 16th century Spanish explorer; silver from the Civil War; the legendary lost diary of anarchist Kate Austin, who lived on the farm in the 1890s; and a mysterious limestone sculpture of dubious origin. Springer interweaves the stories surrounding these treasures with those of his family to spin a tale of spirit possession, Napalm, Indian massacres, early American opera, fanatical obsessions, 200 tons of dirt, and the way mothers try to protect their families from wounds that never heal. At its core, The Disappointment meditates on the ways history is passed along, altered, and sometimes lost through archeological findings. Tonight's screening will be introduced by writer Brian Holmes. Co-presented by the Video Data Bank. 2007, Brian Springer, USA, Beta SP video, 70 mins plus discussion.
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Evil (Tony Cokes, 2003). Courtesy the artist. | | Tony Cokes: Notes on Evil (and Others)
Thursday, March 31, 6:00 p.m.
Tony Cokes in person!
In his incisively witty videos and installations, Tony Cokes juxtaposes familiar archival footage, Google searches, and Hollywood imagery with text and popular music to critique the media's often reductive representations of race and class. This evening's screening surveys Cokes' career and includes Black Celebration (1988), selections from the Pop Manifesto project (2000-04) and his on-going Evil series (2004-), including the US premiere of Evil.20.b.om.h (2011). The Pop Manifestos connects the history of pop with a larger, nefarious matrix of capitalist production. The Evil videos continue the biting aims of the Pop Manifestos in a more fervently politicized manner, tackling post 9/11 political flash points-Abu Ghraib, the Patriot Act, and various speeches of the Bush Administration-to explore the mediated rhetoric surrounding the US's ongoing "war on terror." 1988-2011, Tony Cokes, USA, multiple formats, ca. 75 mins plus discussion.
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Principle 2 (Botborg, 2007). Courtesy the artists. | | Botborg!
Thursday, April 7, 6:00 p.m.
Live performance! Joe Musgrove and Scott Sinclair in person!
As Botborg, Berlin/Brisbane-based artists and musicians Joe Musgrove and Scott Sinclair fuse and rewire raw electronic signals to create intensely visceral experiences of sound-color synaesthesia. Using a complex array of custom electronics, audio and video mixers, cameras and screens, the duo blends sound and vision into a self-perpetuating web of interdependent color and rhythm, generated (in real time) entirely by device feedback. In their first US duo performance, Musgrove and Sinclair will present a new, improvisatory performance, incorporating the unique characteristics of the Film Center's theater into their system. Botborg's work has screened around the globe and they have performed throughout Europe and Australia, including at Ars Electronica in Linz, Austria and the Spectropia Festival in Riga, Latvia. Co-presented by the experimental music series Lampo (www.lampo.org). 2011, Joe Musgrove/Scott Sinclair, Australia/Germany, multiple formats, ca. 60 mins plus discussion.
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Aberration of Light (Sandra Gibson, Luis Recoder, Olivia Block, 2010–11). Courtesy the artists. | | Aberration of Light: Dark Chamber Disclosure
Thursday, April 14, 6:00 p.m.
Live performance!
Sandra Gibson, Luis Recoder, and Olivia Block in person!
"Sandra Gibson and Luis Recoder are creating some of the most innovative and engaging light works of the present time." — Mark Webber, London Film Festival
Since 2001, New York-based artists Sandra Gibson and Luis Recoder have collaborated on a series of performances and installations that transform the mundane mechanics of film projection into sublime experiences of light and space. The duo uses a system of film loops, crystals, and hand gestures to bend, reflect, and refract the projector's beam, recasting the theatrical space of the cinema into a unique medium for sculpting light. This evening, in their first-ever Chicago appearance together, Gibson and Recoder present their latest projector performance, developed with noted Chicago-based composer and sound artist, Olivia Block. Block, who mixes field recordings and live instrumentation, has been likened to "a good cinematographer who happens to use sounds instead of images" (Peter Margasak, Chicago Reader). This is the second piece the three have created together; the first, Untitled (2008) premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and screened at the Tate Modern, London, and Redcat, Los Angeles. 2010-11, Sandra Gibson/Luis Recoder/Olivia Block, USA, multiple formats, ca. 60 mins plus discussion.
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| | Any person with a disability who would like to request an accommodation for this program should contact the Disability and Learning Resource Center at dlrc@saic.edu or 312.499.4278 as soon as possible to allow adequate time to make proper arrangements.
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About the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC)
Educating artists, designers, and scholars since 1866, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago is one of the most distinguished training grounds in these disciplines. As one of the two bodies that make up the Art Institute of Chicago, SAIC's unparalleled transdisciplinary approach to art and design education is seen in the twenty-seven areas of study it offers through a range of graduate, undergraduate, and post-baccalaureate programs. Notable alumni of the School include Paul Chan, Richard Hunt, Halston, Joan Mitchell, Elizabeth Murray, LeRoy Neiman, Georgia O'Keeffe, Claes Oldenburg, David Sedaris, Robert Storr, and Rirkrit Tiravanija. | | | CATE SPRING 2011 Schedule 2/03 – Vivienne Dick: No Wave Films
2/10 – The Wild Triumphs of Martha Colburn (in person!)
2/17 – Rose Lowder's Bouquets (in person!)
2/24 – Andrea Geyer: Criminal Case (in person!)
3/03 – Radical Closure (curated by Akram Zaatari)
3/10 – Yael Bartana: A Declaration (in person!)
3/17 – The Disappointment: Or, the Force of Credulity (filmmaker Brian Springer in person!)
3/31 – Tony Cokes: Notes on Evil (and Others) (in person!)
4/07 – Botborg! (Scott Sinclair and Joe Musgrove in person!)
4/14 – Aberration of Light: Dark Chamber Disclosure (Sandra Gibson, Luis Recoder, and Olivia Block in person!)
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