Author: George Clark

Session #8: About The Island, curated by George Clark
Tuesday 28 March 2017, 2:00-5:00
Birkbeck Cinema, 43 Gordon Square, London, WC1H 0PD
Essay Film Festival

Spanning the Tropic of Cancer, the island of Taiwan is located south of Japan with the East China Sea to the north, the Philippine Sea to the east, the Luzon Strait directly to the south and the South China Sea to the southwest. The history of the island can be read in its complex landscapes. Filmed across central Taiwan Sea of Clouds / 雲海 approaches landscape as a contested terrain marked by changing histories of interpretation and occupation. The film is structured around an interview with contemporary artist Chen Chieh-jen. In order to describe the approach to his work, Chen recalls the tradition of using screenings as a means of covert political assembly during the Japanese colonial period. In bringing these materials together the film attempts to map the contours, slippages and broader resonances within the mountain landscapes in order to find ways into the complex history of labour, colonisation and cinema in Taiwan.

For this special screening at the Essay Film Festival George Clark will present and discuss his film as part of his broader research into Taiwanese politics and moving image culture. The illustrated talk will range from the Japanese colonial period to the avant-garde journal Theatre Quarterly and the work of artists such as Chen Chieh-jen and Kao Chung-li, ethnographer Hu Tai-Li and independent filmmaker Huang Ming-chuan.

The talk will include rare screening of Chang Chao-Tang’s The Boat-Burning Festival / 王船的祭典 (1979) and conclude with the film The Pursuit of What Was / 物的追尋 (2008) by Ya-Li Huang(director of Le Moulin). Ya-Li Huang will join George Clark and take part in a discussion on cinema in Taiwan chaired by researcher and curator Julian Ross.

Programme:
Sea of Clouds / 雲海
George Clark, UK / Taiwan, 2016, 16min

The Pursuit of What Was/物的追尋
Ya-Li Huang, Taiwan, 2008, 22 min

The Boat-Burning Festival / 王船的祭典
Chang Chao-Tang, Taiwan, 1979, 20 min

The title for this programme is in reference to the 1998 documentary retrospective curated by Chang Chao-Tang for the first edition of the Taiwan International Documentary Festival called About The Island: Taiwan Documentary Retrospctive. With thanks to Taiwan Doc and Taiwan Film Institute.

ARQUEOLOGIA DA PAISAGEM/ LANDSCAPE ARCHEOLOGY
III FRONTEIRA – International Documentary and Experimental Film Festival
http://www.fronteirafestival.com/
15-26 March 2017

Arqueologia da paisagem / landscape archeology is programme dedicated to my  recent film work at the upcoming Fronteira Festival in Brazil.  Now in its third edition the festival is dedicated to documentary and experimental film. This year the programme will also include work by Lewis Klahr, Fern Silva, Tomonari Nishikawa, Ana Vaz, Gabriel Abrantes, Mónica Savirón, Khavn De La Cruz, Brigid McCaffrey, Julio Bressane among others and focuses on the work of Rita Azevedo Gomes, Boris Lehman, Abigail Child and Ken Jacobs.

Mostra ARQUEOLOGIA DA PAISAGEM – GEORGE CLARK
24 March, Cine Ritz, Goiânia GO, Brasil
Sea of Clouds, George Clark (UK / Taiwan, 2016, 16 min)
A Distant Echo, George Clark (UK / USA, 2016, 82 min)

Lav Diaz: Journeys
London Gallery West
27 January – 12 March 2017

The first substantial exhibition in London devoted to the work of Lav Diaz, one of the greatest radical artists of contemporary cinema. For this exhibition London Gallery West will screen a rotating programme of Diaz’s extraordinary epics.

Independent Filipino filmmaker Diaz describes himself as a storyteller who makes films about the struggles of his people. His films tell quiet tales of everyday sorrow and resilience, and of the existential quest of a people betrayed by the postcolonial nation state. His films demonstrate a radical reworking of melodrama that extends the possibilities of cinema by combining physical cinematic realism with poetry, modernist literature, painterly landscape, musical improvisation, theatrical performance, ritual intensity and duration.

Shot mostly in black and white, Diaz makes notoriously long films with the economy of means afforded by digital. Diaz’s method of filmmaking exemplifies an organic process that merges fictional storytelling with the material density and tempo of the locality of shooting. Astonishing rhythmic pacing creates a powerful dialectic between the microscopic gestures and steadfast movements of powerless bodies, the immensity of natural and historical forces, and spectral presence.

Diaz was winner of the Golden Lion at the 2016 Venice Film Festival, the Silver Bear Alfred Bauer award at the 2016 Berlin Film Festival, among other prestigious prizes. He is a Radcliffe–Harvard Film Study Center Fellow. Retrospectives of his work have recently been held at the Jeu de Paume museum, Courtisane Festival, and the Film Society of Lincoln Center.

Diaz will be in attendance for an international symposium (3-5 March) on his films and artistic practice and the broader issues they raise. As part of the symposium there will be a special screening of Batang West Side and conversation on Sunday 5 March in collaboration with MUBI.

Exhibition and events co-curated by May Adadol Ingawanij, Michael Mazière, George Clark and Julian Ross.

 

 

 

Sunday, January 15, 2017, 7:30pm
Los Angeles Filmforum presents
A Distant Echo, by George Clark
At the Spielberg Theatre at the Egyptian, 6712 Hollywood Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90028
Filmmaker George Clark in person! Los Angeles premiere!

“Filmforum kicks off our 42^nd year with our friend George Clark, who is returning to Los Angeles to present his feature film A Distant Echo. Mythic, quiet, and beautifully shot on 35mm film in various California deserts, Clark’s film explores themes of culture, cultural excavation and appropriation, and the construction of history. Playing with movement and light in natural settings, with a glorious score, layered with a dialogue of two explorers, the film re-enacts the negotiations of an archaeologist from Cairo with members of an Egyptian tribe who guard ancient culture hidden in tombs lost in the desert. The scenario for the film was adapted from the 1969 Egyptian film A Night of Counting the Years, directed by Shadi Abdel Salam, creating a layered story with echoes of ancient Egypt, reflections on the diversity of desert ecology and recent archaeological digs for lost Hollywood film sets. Working in collaboration with the musician and composer Tom Challenger, a new choral composition was created and recorded for the film, drawing on traditional and modern acoustic techniques to reflect the shifting sands of the desert landscapes.” – Los Angeles Filmforum

A Distant Echo draws on the history of Hollywood’s fascination with ancient Egypt. This special screening and the US premiere of the film will take place in the historic Egyptian Theatre on Hollywood Blvd. Opened in 1922 the cinema was built by showman Sid Grauman and real estate developer Charles E. Toberman. The lavish movie palace was designed by Meyer & Holler architects and took 18 months to construct. The design was influenced by public fascination with ancient Egypt prompted by Howard Carter’s famous expeditions in search of the tomb of Tutankhamun that was eventually discovered on November 4, 1922—just two weeks after the Egyptian Theatre opened. Cecile B. Demille’s The Ten Commandments was premiered at Egyptian Theatre on December 4, 1923.

A Distant Echo, Egyptian Theatre Poster designed by Lucas Quigley

Tickets: $10 general; $6 for students/seniors; free for Filmforum members. Available in advance from Brown Paper Tickets at or at the door.

Los Angeles Filmforum is the city’s longest-running organization dedicated to weekly screenings of experimental film, documentaries, video art, and experimental animation. 2017 is their 42^nd year.

For more information: www.lafilmforum.org or 323-377-7238

Sea of Clouds screening
FILMVIRUS: RHIZOME
10-11 December 2016 at THE READING ROOM, Bangkok,

“In this model, culture spreads like the surface of a body of water, spreading towards available spaces or trickling downwards towards new spaces through fissures and gaps, eroding what is in its way. The surface can be interrupted and moved, but these disturbances leave no trace, as the water is charged with pressure and potential to always seek its equilibrium, and thereby establish smooth space.” – Deleuze, Gilles and Félix Guattari. 1980. A Thousand Plateaus

FILMVIRUS and THE READING ROOM would like to present our special new year’s gift – FILMVIRUS: RHIZOME, programmes of selected rare experimental films from all around the world. It’s your chance here to see TRAILERS, the latest feature film of Rouzbeh Rashidi, one of the most prominent Irish filmmakers today from Dublin’s Experimental Film Society. From Italy, Enzo Cillo will captivate you with his filmography of darkness and beauty. Also added with another film from George Clark, a curator plus experimental filmmaker from UK. Rare breed of shorts from Chinese video artist Lu Yang could challenge and destroy your senses. Special programmes from Saigon-based Trương Minh Quý, his debut feature City of Mirrors world-premiered at Busan. And double experimental programmes from Nguyen Trinh Thi, one of the most important filmmakers in Southeast Asia region who founded Hanoi DocLab, which helps create new generations of Vietnamese filmmaker, film screenings and challenge us with interesting documentary works for all these years.

ในรูปแบบนี้ วัฒนธรรมแพร่กระจายไปราวผิวหน้าของวงน้ำ แพร่กระจายไปในทุกพื้นที่ที่ไปได้ หรือเล็ดลอดลงสู่พื้นที่ใหม่ๆผ่านทางรอยแตกและช่องว่าง กัดเซาะทุกสิ่งที่ขวางทาง ผิวเปลือกของมันอาจถูกขวางกั้นหรือเคลื่อนย้ายออกไป หากความโกลาหลนี้จะไม่ทิ้งร่องรอยไว้ เช่นเดียวกันกับน้ำที่กระทบเข้ากับแรงกดดันและศักยภาพแห่งการคืนสู่สมดุล และถึงที่สุด สถาปนาพื้นที่อันเรียบสนิท – Deleuze, Gilles and Félix Guattari. 1980. A Thousand Plateaus

FILMVIRUS and THE READING ROOM ชวนคุณชม FILMVIRUS WILDTYPE :RHIZOME โปรแกรมภาพยนตร์ทดลองคัดสรรจากทุกมุมโลก โปรแกรมพิเศษที่เป็เหมือนของขวัญปีใหม่จากใจทีมงาน FILMVIRUS ทุกคน. ในงานท่านจะได้พบกับ Trailers ภาพยนตร์ขนาดยาวเรื่องล่าสุดของ Rouzbeh Rashidi ผู้กำกับภาพยนตร์คนสำคัญจากไอร์แลนด์ หนึ่งในกลุ่ม Experimental Film Society กลุ่มคนทำหนังทดลองที่น่าจับตาจากดับลิน โปรแกรมหนังสั้นแห่งความมืดและความงามของ Enzo Cillo คนทำหนังสทดลองจาก อิตาลี ภาพยนตร์สั้นจาก George Clark ภัณฑารักษ์แะคนทำหนังทดลองจากอังกฤษ โปรแกรมหนังสั้นสายพันธุ์พิเศษสุดขีดคลั่งจาก Lu Yang คนทำวีดีโอชาวจีนที่จะท้าทายทำลายการรับรู้ของคุณ โปรแกรมหนังสั้นพิเศษของ Trương Minh Quý คนทำหนังสั้นจากโฮจิมินห์ที่ภาพยนตร์ขนาดยาวเรื่องแรกของเขา City of Mirrors ได้ฉายที่ปูซาน และพิเศษสุด สองโปรแกรมหนังทดลองจาก Nguyen Trinh Thi คนทำสารคดีทดลองจากเวียดนาม หนึ่งในผู้กำกับหญิงที่น่าจับตามองที่สุดคนหนึ่งในอุษาคเนย์ และผู้ก่อตั้ง Hanoi DOCLAB กลุ่มคนที่ช่วยกันฝึกคนทำหนังหน้าใหม่ จัฉายหนัง และทำหนังสารคดีที่น่าสนใจมากมาย

Thanks to Wiwat Lertwiwatwongsa.
Poster by Nodjadong Boonprasert

This is not film-making. Artists work for cinema
Te Uru Waitakere Contemporary Gallery, Auckland Tuesday 6 December 2016, 7pm.
This is not film-making. Artists work for cinema features five new works by New Zealand artists Gavin Hipkins, Juliet Carpenter and Gregory Kan, Daniel Malone, Louise Menzies and Nathan Gray (AU). Commissioned by CIRCUIT and curated by George Clark (UK), each artist was invited to make a single channel work up to ten minutes in length in response to the writings of the late New Zealand conceptual artist Julian Dashper (1960-2009).

Screening will be followed by discussion withJuliet Carpenter, Gavin Hipkins, Louise Menzies and George Clark

Gavin Hipkins, New World (2016) Digital Video, Sound, 12:38 minutes
Louise Menzies, Go into the density of it (2016) Digital Video, Sound, 6:30 minutes
Juliet Carpenter and Gregory Kan, mean time 2016 (2016), Digital Video, Sound, 5:38 min
Nathan Gray, Untitled (ß) August 2016 (2016), Digital Video, Sound, 11:56 min
Daniel Malone, Victory Over The Sun, Or, Spaghetti Western Unlike You & Me (2016) Digital Video, Sound, 11 mins, 21 secs

 

House Studies II
published by Jonathan Smart Gallery, New Zealand
Launch event: Wednesday, November 16, Split/Fountain, Auckland
& Saturday, November 19, Smash Palace, Christchurch

‘House Studies II’ is a publication with contributions by Aodhan Madden, Ash Kilmartin, Daegan Wells, Emma Fitts with Raewyn Martyn, Georgina Watson, Sophie Bannan, Joshua Harris, Kim Pieters, Kirstin Carlin, and Louise Menzies with George Clark.

This is the second iteration of an ongoing project that reimagines specific histories of practice – relative to their natural and built landscapes, social and political environments – forming fictional and actual communities of practice. This publication has been curated and compiled by Sophie Bannan, and printed with the generous support of Jonathan Smart Gallery.

Together with Louise Menzies we contributed the text Moving Towards The Sun, an illustrated conversation around our practices.

Softcover, 190 x 290mm, 68 pages + poster

Cover image: One of the first three photographs taken from the Anglo-Australian telescope at Siding Springs, South-Eastern Australia, in 1974 by Ben Gascoigne. Courtesy of National Archives of Australia.