From the collection of the n Z7 m o Prelinger h v Jjibrary t p San Francisco, California 2007 San Francisco Cinematheque 1999 Program Notes San Francisco Cinematheque 145 Ninth Street Suite 240 San Francisco, California 94110 Telephone: 415.552.1990 Facsimile: 415.552.2067 Email: [email protected] www.sfcinematheque.org cover Leslie image © Thornton: Production Still, Peggy and Fred in Hell, 1984 Staff. 1999 SAN FRANCISCO Director Steve Anker Artistic Co-Director CINEMATHEQUE Irina Leimbacher Office Manager Steve Polta Program Notebook Producer Pamela Jean Smith with Paul Rust and Steve Polta Program Note Contributors Charles Boone Marina McDougall Gary Brewer John K. Mrozik David Conner Celine Salazar Parrenas Tarik Elhaik Steve Polta Cristina Ibarra Konrad Steiner Irina Leimbacher Program Co-Sponsors Berkeley Art Museum San Francisco Art Institute CCAC Institute San Francisco International Film Festival Cine Action San Francisco Museum of Modern Art Cinemayaat, the Arab Film Festival San Francisco State University Cinema Film Arts Foundation Department Frameline San Francisco Arts Commission Gallery Galeria de la Raza Somar Gallery Headlands Center for the Arts Stanford University's Race and Sex Workshop National Asian American Telecommunications Stanford University's Asian American Association (NAATA) Graduate Group Pacific Film Archive Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Robert Koch Gallery Guest Curators and Co-Curators Rebecca Barten Ivan Jaigirdar Bill Berkson and Nathaniel Dorsky Karl Bruce Knapper Charles Boone Akira Mizuta Lippit Gary Brewer and Marina McDougall "Mr. 8mm" Whitney Chadwick Celine Salazar Parrenas Anita Chang Adriana Rosas-Walsh Sandra Davis Joel Shepard Tarik Elhaik and Khaiil Benkirane David Sherman Kathy Geritz Joel Singer and J arris Crystal Lipzin Michella Rivera Gravage Melinda Stone and Bill Daniel in conjunction Christina Ibarra with Southern Exposure Board of Directors. 1999 Allison Austin Kerri Condron Kerri Condron Julia Segrove-Jaurigui Elise Hurwitz Mary Tsiongas Marina McDougall Table of Contents FANTASIZING THE INTIMATE OTHER 1 RADICAL RE-PRESENTATION WOMEN, SURREALISM AND FILM PROGRAM THREE 28 INSECT SHORTS 1 ALWAYS AT THE AVANTE-GARDE OF THE SPACE VALUE: NEW BAY AREA AVANTE-GARDE UNTIL PARADISE AND EXPERIMENTS ON FILM AND VIDEO 2 BEYOND 30 TWO EVENINGS WITH SADIE BENNING 4 OUT OF THE TIME CLOSET THE LONG FORM, EAST COAST 1969-71 FILMS TO GO ON LIVING: PROGRAM THREE ERNIE GEHR'S STILL AN EVENING WITH ANNE ROBERTSON 7 WITH UNTITLED: PART ONE, 1981 31 OUT OF THE TIME CLOSET: ARTISTS AND FILMS: CROSSOVER PIX THE LONG FORM, EAST COAST 1969-71 PROGRAM ONE 32 PROGRAM ONE KEN JACOBS' TOM, TOM, THE PIPER'S COMPULSIVE REPETITIONS AN EVENING SON 9 WITH MARTIN ARNOLD 34 WOMEN ON THE VERGE: PEGGY'S PLAYHOUSE A PEGGY AHWESH THE MULTIPLE PERSONAE OF ANNE RETROSPECTIVE PROGRAM ONE MCGUniE AND CLAERE BAIN 11 DEAD MEN 35 OUT OF THE TIME CLOSET: POP RESURRECTION: A WARHOL THE LONG FORM, EAST COAST 1969-71 WEEKEND 37 PROGRAM TWO MICHAEL SNOW'S LA REGION CENTRALE ONE EYE ON THE CAMERA, THE OTHER ON 13 THE WORLD A VAN DER KEUKEN TRIBUTE PROGRAM ONE CINE-PHANTASMS: AN EVENING WITH ZOE LIVING SPACES 41 BELOFF AND GEN KEN MONTGOMERY 15 ONE EYE ON THE CAMERA, THE OTHER ON BIG AS LIFE AN AMERICAN HISTORY OF THE WORLD A VAN DER KEUKEN TRIBUTE 8MM FILMS PROGRAM TWO PROGRAM SIX REALISM-AS-PORTAIT 17 UNEASY ESSAYS 44 TRANS FIXED AN EVENING WITH MARK EYES WIDE OPEN: NEW CURATORIAL LAPORE 19 PERSPECTIVES PROGRAM ONE RADICAL RE-PRESENTATION WOMEN, RE-FRAMING LEBANON: FOUR RADICAL SURREALISM AND FILM PROGRAM ONE 20 VISUAL ACTS AN EVENING OF LEBANESE SHORTS 46 PANIC BODIES BAY AREA PREMIERE OF MIKE HOOLBOOM'S NEWEST FILM 22 TIME LAPSES: A PROGRAM OF EXPERIMENTAL FILM 48 RADICAL RE-PRESENTATION WOMEN, SURREALISM AND FILM PROGRAM TWO 25 EYES WIDE OPEN: NEW CURATORIAL PERSPECTIVES BIG AS LIFE AN AMERICAN HISTORY OF PROGRAM TWO 8MM FILMS PROGRAM SEVEN HOMEGIRL VISIONS 50 WILLIE VARELA AND JANIS CRYSTAL LIPZIN IN PERSON 26 LOVE, LANGUAGE AND VIOLENCE RECENT WORK BY DIANE BONDER, RAY REA AND IN HIS OWN VOICE AN EVENING WITH MACHIKO SAITO 52 WILLIE VARELA 27 Table of Contents Y2K PROPHECIES NEW VIDEOS BY CHIP LORD, GUSTAVO VAZQUEZ AND CONSCIOUSNESS CINEMA PROGRAM TWO GUILLERMO GOMEZ-PENA 54 FLOWS OF PERCEPTION 82 EYES WIDE OPEN: NEW CURATORIAL ROBERT BECK MEMORIAL (NOMADIC) PERSPECTIVES PROGRAM THREE CINEMA (DOUBLE FEATURE) 84 THE SEX OF BODIES IN COLOR 56 FACING FEAR PROGRAM TWO ALTERNATIVE ENTERTAINMENT FILMS BY CRIMES OF COURAGE AND FEAR: A FILM KONRAD STEINER 58 PROGRAM WITH SUBTITLED: AN INTERDISCIPLINARY EYES WIDE OPEN: NEW CURATORIAL PERFORMANCE 87 PERSPECTIVES PROGRAM FOUR CONSCIOUSNESS CINEMA FITTING IN 61 PROGRAM THREE IN SEARCH OF SENSE AND SEQUENCE 91 CONCRETE SURFACES/ DEMATERIALIZING PRACTICES FILMS BY LUIS A. RECODER 1999 RECENT WORK BY ELI RUDNICK AND AND STEVE POLTA 63 MICHAEL RUDNICK 93 EYES WIDE OPEN: NEW CURATORIAL CONSCIOUSNESS CINEMA PROGRAM FOUR PERSPECTIVES FLESH OF CONSCIOUSNESS 94 PROGRAM FIVE IDENTITY CRISES CRITICAL REVISIONS LYRICAL FORMS SUPER-8MM FILMS BY FROM THE INDIAN DIASPORA 65 CECILE FONTAINE & MARCELLE THIRACHE 96 EYES WIDE OPEN: NEW CURATORIAL PERSRECTrVES PROGRAM SIX CONSCIOUSNESS CINEMA CONSTELLATION OF HOME 67 PROGRAM FIVE CONTESTED PERSONAS 98 EYES WIDE OPEN: NEW CURATORIAL DELUGE A PROGRAM OF RECENT WORK PERSPECTIVES PROGRAM SEVEN BY BRITISH ARTIST TONY SINDEN 99 MI CINEMA, UNA VOZ POETICA 69 HOMAGE TO JAMES BROUGHTON EYES WIDE OPEN: NEW CURATORIAL ECSTASY FOR EVERYONE 101 PERSPECTIVES PROGRAM EIGHT PASSION ON THE EDGE 71 CASPAR STRACKE'S CIRCLE'S SHORT CIRCUIT 103 WHATEVER IT TAKES FILMS (FUCKIN') th FROM THE EDGE 73 37 AND ARBOR FILM FESTIVAL TOUR 104 INTERSTICES VIDEO MAKING IN AND OUT CONSCIOUSNESS CINEMA PROGRAM SIX OF MOROCCO 74 CONSCIOUS SPACES 107 YOUR CHANCE TO LIVE! ARTISTS AND FILMS: CROSSOVER PIX SURVTVTNG EARTHQUAKES, FIRES, PROGRAM THREE 109 FLOODS, ASSORTED CALAMITIES AND MORE 76 ITALIAN SUBVERSIVES 1965: PIER PAOLO PASOLINI'S HAWKS AND CONSCIOSNESS CINEMA PROGRAM ONE SPARROWS 111 DAWNING OF AWARENESS 77 NERVOUS KEN SHAKES UP THE CONCIOUSNESS CINEMA PROGRAM SEVEN HEADLANDS 79 SLEEP OVER 113 FACING FEAR PROGRAM ONE 80 Table of Contents A MEMORIAL TRIBUTE TO RUDY BURCKHARDT 115 ITALIAN SUBVERSIVES 1965 MARCO BELLOCCHIO'S FIRST IN THE POCKET 117 SANDRA DAVIS' A PREPONDERANCE OF EVIDENCE 119 FILM/VTOEO INDEX 121 FILM/VIDEOMAKER INDEX 125 BIG AS LIFE : AN AMERICAN HISTORY OF 8MM FILMS The Pacific Film Archive and San Francisco Cinematheque continue their monthly series condensed from the 50 plus retrospective organized by The Museum of Modern Art Associate Curator Jytte Jensen and Cinematheque Director Steve Anker. Created with "low-end" equipment and miniscule budgets, these films and videos convey an intimacy rarely encountered in the public cinema. FANTASIZING THE INTIMATE OTHER Tuesday, January 19, 1999 — Pacific Film Archive Four recent Super-8 sound films which use drama and performance to create intimate fantasies and metaphorical visions touching on sexuality and identity. Earthly Possessions (1992) by Pelle Lowe; Dark, Scenes from the Barn (1992) by Robert Huot; Our Us We Bone One So Naked Known (1992) by Anie Stanley; and Warm Broth (1988) by Tom Rhoads. INSECT SHORTS Curated by Gary Brewer and Marina McDougall Presented in conjunction with the exhibition THEM at Somar Gallery Sunday, January 31, 1999 — San Francisco Art Institute "...then you don't like all insects?" the Gnat went on, as quietly as if nothing had happened. "I like them when they can talk," Alice said. "None of them ever talk where I come from." —Lewis Caroll, Through the Looking-Glass Flea-sized visitors find themselves in a sticky fix when they check into The Cobweb Hotel (1936, 8 minutes) of animator Max Fleischer's imagination. Working in the tradition of photographer Eadweard Muybridge and French physiologist Etienne Jules Marey, biodynamic engineer, Dr. Robert Full, head of UC Berkeley's Poly Pedal Laboratory, researches insect locomotion in studies that capture centipedes and cockroaches running along treadmills at speeds up to 1,000 images per second. Dr. Full will appear In Person to describe how these motion studies have become the basis for 3-D computer models and the design of robots that move like insects. (30 minutes) To illustrate the physics principle of "friction" this whimsical education film, A Million to One (5 minutes), employs New York City's renown Heckler's flea circus. Ant City by Moss (Paul F.) & Thelma Schnee (1951, 10 minutes) is an educational film classic about the social insect, the ant. The improvisational quality of the narration delivered by Moss Schnee with his heavy Brooklyn accent reveals as much about human notions of organized society as animal ones. 1 San Francisco Cinematheque Karl Von Frisch's Indications of Distance and Direction in the Honey Bee (1979, 19 minutes) studies the amazing wiggle and waggle in the round dances of the honey bee which are performed among bees to communicate the location of flowers. Mark Thompson's astonishing Immersion (1987, 7 minute excerpt) captures a performance in which the artist places a queen bee on the crown of his head. Over a period of about an hour, worker bees attracted to the queen slowly cover Thompson's entire head—his eyes, mouth and ears—hanging together in chain-like formations. In order to experience this "immersion" into the hum of the hive, Thompson maintains Buddha-like concentration and calm throughout. Special thanks to the Liz Keim, Film Program Director of the Exploratorium and Rick Prelinger of Prelinger Archives for their generous loan of prints for this program. —Program Notes by Gary Brewer and Marina McDougall— SPACE VALUE: NEW BAY AREA EXPERIMENTS ON FILM AND VIDEO Thursday, February 4, 1999 — Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Space Value is a program of new works by Bay Area film and video makers who challenge conventional notions of spatial perception through various techniques of visual fragmentation and temporal abstraction.