Time Based Art performances on screen at Northwest Film Center

TBA ON SCREEN
In partnership with PICA and Cinema Project, Northwest Film Center present this series of time-based media projects informed by visual and performance art practices. For a complete schedule of PICA's Time Based Art performances and events go to www.pica.org.


SEPT 9 14
SAT 2 PM, THUR 7 PM
FILMS BY JOHANNA BILLING


"The protagonists of Johanna Billing's films remain silent unless they sing."-Marabou Park
Feelings of melancholy and intrigue permeate Billing's films, which explore changing societies and the emotions people lose touch with. Oscillating between the staged and the real, the works synthesize charged silences and permeating pop songs in order to reflect the psychology of group dynamic. Included in this screening of multiple shorts works is YOU DON'T LOVE ME YET (2003), which features 40 musicians recording a cover version of the Roky Erickson song of the same name. The film is a product of an extensive tour that includes multiple interpretations by local participants at each venue. Other films, usually shown as looping installations in gallery settings, capture art class performing a dance, mechanically document the process of moving, and observe a large crowd of young people seemingly waiting for something to happen. Billings lives and works in Stockholm, Sweden and has been the subject of numerous solo shows over the last few years in Europe and the U.S. including Venice Biennial P.S. 1, New York City.


SEPT 9 10
SAT 4 PM, SUN 4 PM
FILMS BY SUTAPA BISWAS


The film installations of British/East-Indian artist Sutapa Biswas are dreamy, metaphorical journeys that re-imagine culture and relationships through diverse time periods and works of art. The program includes selections from the last ten years of Biswas' work and features UNTITLED (THE TRIALS AND TRIBULATIONS OF MICKET BAKER, 1967). The film casts an obscure British B-movie actor in a scenario inspired by the work of the American painter Edward Hopper. Like watching a living, breathing painting, the camera remains stationary as the viewer regards a naked, aging man standing in quiet reverie, bathed in the sunlight that slowly shifts across his body through the window of a traditional English drawing room. In this poignant study of intimacy and vulnerability, Biswas shifts traditional power relationships between viewer and artist, artist and audience. Biswas lives and works in London and has had her work exhibited internationally, including the Tate Modern, London and Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven. (40 mins.)


Biswas also has an installation at Reed College's Cooley Gallery and will stage a live performance piece based on the work there on September 17, 9pm at the Hawthorne Bridge in a special collaboration between PICA and the Douglas F. Cooley Memorial Art Gallery, Reed College.




SEPT 10 12 13 15
SUN 2 PM, TUE 7 PM, WED 7 PM, FRI 9:30 PM
HIDDEN INSIDE MOUNTAINS
US 2005
DIRECTOR: LAURIE ANDERSON


Commissioned by EXPO 2005 Aichi, Japan, HIDDEN INSIDE MOUNTAINS is a high definition film that premiered on the largest high definition Astrovision screen in the world and features an original score written and recorded by Laurie Anderson with additional vocals by singer/performer Antony (of Antony and the Johnsons). Comprised of short stories about nature, artifice and dreams set in a fictitious world of theatrical spaces, each unfolds through music, gesture, text and poetic visual images. Written by Anderson and presented in both Japanese and English, the haunting music features violins, bells, dog barks and melody as well as many of Anderson's signature electronic sounds. (25 mins.)




HOME OF THE BRAVE: A CONCERT FILM BY LAURIE ANDERSON
US 1986
DIRECTOR: LAURIE ANDERSON


Filmed in a studio and in part before a live audience, HOME OF THE BRAVE is an eye-popping tapestry stitched with video, chaotic choreography, subtitles, wild props such as dancing shirts and a so-called drum suit that turns the singer's entire body into a percussive instrument, Latin percussionists, a game show hostess, a telephone that drops in from nowhere and a tango by William Burroughs. Among the classic tracks performed are "Excellent Birds," "Sharkey's Day," and "Language is a Virus." "This is a kind of concert film the way my performances are kind of concerts."-
Laurie Anderson. (90 mins.)


SEPT 16 17
SAT 4 PM, SUN 4 PM
TREVOR PAGLEN & THE SPECULATIVE ARCHIVE LECTURE
N4467S: TRACKING THE CIA'S "TORTURE PLANES"


Artist, writer, and "experimental geographer" Trevor Paglen and The Speculative Archive (Julia Meltzer and David Thorne) join forces in a program investigating the secret underworld of government and the war on terror. In recent years, the CIA has been using unmarked civilian airplanes to kidnap and transport suspected terrorists to countries like Poland, Egypt, and Romania where they can be tortured outside of the official U.S. military and prison system. In this lecture-based piece, Paglin uses diagrams, photographs, and other documents, to navigate the fog of misinformation surrounding a Boeing 737 by visiting the street addresses of front companies, observing airfields and comparing many fake signatures attributed to its owner.
WITH
NOT A MATTER OF IT BUT WHEN (2006)
The Speculative Archive's new video began with research around the U.S. National Security Strategy of 2002 and its focus on preemption as a means to spread global democracy. Asking the question: How do visions of the future re-shape the time and experience of the present? the team examines how people live between political possibilities (their autocratic regime, American ultimatums) or "Iraqi-style civil war or the devil we know." Are these the only possible visions of a future?


Northwest Film Center - Portland Art Museum: 1219 SW Park Ave.
Admission Prices: $7.00 General, $6.00 Members, Students, Seniors