TERRA COGNITA: FACE|OFF
SCOTLAND: FORMATIVE MEMORIES OF GLASGOW BY LOUIS BENASSI
Sept. 20 | 7:45pm | The Hideout (downstairs theater)
Introduction includes a special piece of historical footage that is held dear to the Scottish psyche.
Another Place
Scotland | 2000 | digibeta | 16min | color
DIR Dalziel & Scullion
The portraiture of a small fishing community on a remote island in the North of Scotland, the inverse of Scottish urbanism. The portraits at times seem pre-Raphaelite, the subjects stare beyond the camera lens and we feel their solitude. A gentle ethnographic intervention and a beautifully composed piece of ambient cinema.
And Will Take Effect From the Date Stated
Ireland | 2002 | DV | 10min | color
DIR Tony Mass
"What I discover in nothingness is right because that is what it wants to be." Conceptual, absurd and Kafkaesque, Mass’s work seeks out models of identity within the bureaucratic machine and its dominate language, which dictates the conventions of rules. The babble of narratives blurs the edges of ourselves.
Gesticulations-in-Articulations
U.K. | 2001 | digibeta | color
DIR Louise Thompson
A study in how we come across to others—like the pop psycho-
logy of Big Brother. A single-screen triptych where each panel reveals a plethora of facial language and gestured signs used in private, in public, consciously and unconsciously.
Outside Tiffany and Co.
U.K. | 2002 | DV | 8min | color
DIR Rosie Copper
Misguided aspirations and the status of old Hollywood Cinema icons within the context of contemporary society. Rosie Cooper is a member of the ‘Aristasia Society,’ a group of women of varying ages and backgrounds who live in a constructed world adhering to the general rules and aesthetics of the 1920s-50s. Cooper’s performance investigates the aspirational desires of being an artist, primarily using the viewer as a device within her own fantasy.
Outside Metaphor
U.K. | 2002 | Hi-8 | 8min | color
DIR Paul Carter
"The fiction of blowing walls apart." Paul Carter’s work is ongoing, and everything he makes refers to his Becketian "attempted activity." He engages with the paradoxical notions of “cult of personality” and anonymity, and crosses spaces while referencing “other” spaces. This lo-fi video is a violent and claustrophobic confrontation with the politics of art and architecture.
Bob Doesn’t Know
U.K. | 2002 | DV | 10min | color
DIR Anita Bryan
Two months on a building site with a group of international tradesmen in the UK, this documentary captures the hardworking crew as it shares humour and quotidian thoughts. This work illustrates Bryan’s editing skill and, her ability to make subjects feel at ease in front of the camera, and brings to mind the documentary traditions of the British Mass Observation School of the 40s and 50s.
Esoteria Hysteria!
Italy | 1995 | super 8 | 6min | color
DIR Fiorella Rossi
Fiorella Rossi reveals a sense of India and its inherent chaos through strong colours, blistering heat, varied speed and jump cuts. Anthropologist and news producer Naseem Khan plays Khali, who gives us a questioning gaze while wagging a disapproving finger. A subtle, humorous critique on tourists seeking mysticism in India.
Early Alive
England | 2002 | super 8 | 6min | b&w
DIR Sebastian Wrong
When this film was first shown through a ground-level window overlooking a London street, a woman smashed the window. Her bid to reinstate the universal association of a teddy bear as cuddly soft resulted in arrest. "I bought the dirty, ragged bear from a street tinker who said even he had shagged better looking birds." –SW
Face
Japan | 1996 | 16mm | 20min | b&w
DIR Taka Iimura
A hysteria-inducing work of duration and formalist agitation. Great to look at and listen to. From outside the frame, we hear gentle laughter becoming increasingly enigmatic as the faces radiate their mesmerism. Our interior speculations are unleashed as we sit and watch. Just recently screened at Ian White’s (LUX) secret cinema event at the Whitechapel Art Gallery London.
The Analyst
Scotland | 2001 | single channel video installation | 50min | color
DIR Michelle Naismith
Wearing a ruffle neck with contemporary clothing, this woman cradles an object containing the dual metaphor of magical “transformation” and destructive frustration. The contained violence in her gaze creates a paradoxical tension since her gaze is also a calm meditation. Bach's "Goldberg Variations," played by Glenn Gould, and the composition facilitate speculations as far afield as Lacan and Courbet.
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