Conversations at the Edge
Organized by the Department of Film, Video, and New Media at SAIC in association with the Video Data Bank and the Gene Siskel Film Center, Conversations at the Edge is a weekly screening series dedicated to showcasing some of the most exciting work being produced in media today.
Filmmakers in person!
eteam!
2002-07, Franziska Lamprecht and Hajoe Moderegger, USA, ca 90 min.
Since 2002, the German-born, New York-based duo “eteam” (Franziska Lamprecht and Hajoe Moderegger) has undertaken a series of cheeky land-use experiments on small tracts of land purchased through eBay in the American Southwest. Their most recent is chronicled in INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT MONTELLO (2007), a collaboration with their 67 neighbors in Montello, Nevada, to create an international airport in a desolate flyover zone. Also on the program: 1.1 ACRE FLAT SCREEN (2002) and ARTIFICIAL TRAFFIC JAM (2005). Co-presented by the Video Data Bank. Various formats. (Amy Beste)
Thursday, February 7, 6:00 pm
Cristina Venegas in person!
Mapping Cuba’s Digital Audiovisual Landscape
1999-2006, Various directors, Cuba, 87 min.
Guest scholar Cristina Venegas of University of California, Santa Barbara, hosts this wide-ranging selection of videos, presented as part of this month’s Film Center series Clandestinos. The program includes animation (GREEN MEN), performance video (PIN PONG), music video (SANTA), experimental films (FOOLING AROUND WITH THE VIDEO CAMERA; POOL WITH TWO FIGURES; LA ÉPOCA, EL ENCANTO Y EL FIN DE SIGLO), and documentaries (DE GENERACIÓN; WINTER; DEMOLER). In Spanish with English subtitles. Mini-DV video. (Cecilia Cornejo & Luis Ulloa)
Thursday, February 14, 6:00 pm
Artists in person!
I Love Presets
2008, Rob Ray, Jon Satrom, and Jason Soliday, USA, ca. 90 min.
As I Love Presets, Chicago-based sound and new media artists Rob Ray, Jon Satrom, and Jason Soliday do everything wrong the right way. The trio manipulates found sounds and animated GIFs on home-brew equipment in spectacular live audio/video performances, breaking down, complicating, and glorifying instrument settings, tool presets, and art-making interfaces normally accepted as fixed and stable. Ray, Satrom, and Soliday will demo their latest instruments, a video game, and more in a unique CATE set. Various formats. (Amy Beste & Jon Satrom)
Thursday, February 21, 6:00 pm
PRISONERS OF WAR
(PRIGIONIERI DELLA GUERRA)
1995, Yervant Gianikian and Angela Ricci Lucchi, Italy, ca. 90 min.
Milan-based filmmakers Gianikian and Ricci Lucchi (FROM THE POLE TO THE EQUATOR) are renowned for their haunting archival films, assembled from rare early 20th century footage on imperialism, conflict, image-making, and memory. In the mid-1990s, the couple began an extraordinary three-part series on World War I, beginning with PRISONERS OF WAR. The film uses military footage from Czarist Russia and the Austro-Hungarian Empire to show the dehumanization of fallen soldiers, child POWs, and civilian refugees. Presented with the assistance of Northwestern University’s Dept. of French and Italian in conjunction with the symposium “Archives of Cinema / Memories of War.” 16mm. (Amy Beste)
Due to an injury, the filmmakers will not be able to attend the screening as previously announced. We regret any inconvenience.
Thursday, February 28, 8:00 pm
Anne Quirynen in person!
INTERZONE
2007, Anne Quirynen, Germany/India/USA, ca. 60 min.
SAIC faculty member Anne Quirynen has long worked at the intersection of moving image and performance, collaborating with the likes of choreographers William Forsythe, Thomas Hauert, and Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker on videos, installations, and theatrical pieces. Her latest video, the stunning INTERZONE, was commissioned as an opera by the Berliner Festspiele. Featuring music by German composer Enno Poppe, the piece takes up William S. Burroughs’s novel of the same name, using his cut-up method as a structural guide. Mini-DV video. (Amy Beste)