Out of Sight, Out of Mind

Saturday, November 28 @ 8 PM @ CineCycle, 129 Spadina Ave.

Part of Fall 2015


Inspired by a new video from visually impaired artist Lorne Marin (his first moving-image work in over 30 years), this program envisions the act of film/video-making as an attempt to trace that which can no longer be seen. These artists explore the image’s transformation as it passes from the immediacy of seeing to the cages of memory, manipulating materials in ways that directly or indirectly evoke an array of perceptual aberrations. From common chemical reactions to encroaching blindness, these interferences remind us of the lamentable fragility of our sight. But they also reinforce the mind’s ability to capture fleeting visions that, though long lost, may never be forgotten.

Curated by Samuel La France

Programme:

Favorite Sounds | Tony Schwartz | USA | 1963 | 4 mins | Digitized 7’’ tape

Sound documentarian and public health advocate Tony Schwartz invites members of the Jewish Guild for the Blind to describe their favorite sounds.

alexia | Tran T. Kim-Trang | USA | 2000 | 10 mins | Video

alexia is an experimental video about word blindness and metaphor. Divided into five short sections, the tape draws a pattern with the motif of the finger and the moon to ruminate on language and blindness.

SEE/SAW | Charlie Egleston | Canada | 2010 | 5 mins | 16mm

A film about seeing and having seen. Completely hand-processed and painstakingly edited, SEE/SAW is comprised of a series of iris fades—commonly found in silent films to signal the beginning or end of a scene—re-appropriated as a formal approach that frames the desire to see and to remember.

Snowblind | Hollis Frampton | USA | 1968 | 5 mins | 16mm

An homage to Michael Snow’s sculpture Blind. “Another comparison, suggested by the title and effected in stages by the panels, is to progressive loss of vision. This might be a biographical reading, related to Snow’s father, but it also reflects the artist’s sensitivity, his awareness of vision in relation to the other senses (other media). And this is not all, for “blind” can mean other things besides the physiological.” – Martha Langford

Berlin Tiger | Shiloh Cinquemani | USA | 2012 | 3 mins | 16mm

“I can still make out certain colors; I can still see blue and green. And yellow, in particular, has remained faithful to me. I remember when I was young I used to linger in front of certain cages in the Palermo zoo: the cages of the tigers and leopards. I lingered before the tigers’ gold and black. Yellow is still with me, even now.” – Jorge Luis Borges

Wolkenschatten | Anja Dornieden + Juan David González Monroy | 2014 | 17 mins | 16mm on Video

In 1984, for three weeks in May, what appeared to be a giant cloud shrouded the small town of Hüllen-Hüllen in darkness. Before the end of the month the cloud had dispersed and life seemed to return to normal. One month later, however, the town was hastily abandoned and its residents were nowhere to be found. They left most of their belongings behind in such a way as to make one think they would return at any moment…
(Interview with Dornieden + González Monroy by Clint Enns)

Sugar Beach | Mark Loeser | Canada | 2011 | 4 mins | 35mm

Drifting fragments attempt to reconstitute a whole.

Sight | Thirza Cuthand | Canada | 2012 | 3 mins | Video

Super 8 footage layered with Sharpie marked lines and circles obscuring the image illustrates the story of the filmmaker’s experience with temporary episodes of migraine related blindness and her cousin’s self induced blindness later in life. Paralleling the experience of Blindness with Mental Illness, Cuthand deftly elucidates that any of us could lose any of our abilities at any time.

David: Then & Now & Again | Lorne Marin | Canada | 2006-2015 | 10 mins | Video

A series of bodies, at a decade’s remove. After the work of Micah Lexier through “Portrait of David” and “David Then & Now”.

Approximate runtime: 61 minutes + changeovers

David: Then & Now & Again, Lorne Marin

Sugar Beach, Mark Loeser

Sugar Beach, Mark Loeser

Berlin_Tiger_©Shiloh_sm

Berlin Tiger, Shiloh Cinquemani

Wolkenschatten, Anja Dornieden + Juan David González Monroy

Wolkenschatten, Anja Dornieden + Juan David González Monroy

Wolkenschatten, Anja Dornieden + Juan David González Monroy

Wolkenschatten, Anja Dornieden + Juan David González Monroy

Wolkenschatten, Anja Dornieden + Juan David González Monroy

Wolkenschatten, Anja Dornieden + Juan David González Monroy

Sight, Thirza Cuthand

Sight, Thirza Cuthand

alexia, Tran T. Kim-Trang

alexia, Tran T. Kim-Trang

Snowblind, Hollis Frampton

Snowblind, Hollis Frampton

SEE/SAW, Charlie Egleston

SEE/SAW, Charlie Egleston