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Shorts Program
FeeLing Resistance How do we manifest resistance through the spaces we occupy? How does resistance manifest itself on our bodies, our minds, our souls? What are the human materials and psychic energies that provide us with the agency to show up for our collective wills? How does the power of shared resistance allow us to more truthfully feel ourselves? How do our bodies and the spaces they occupy come to be shaped or re-shaped by our defiance? How have our bodies become active sites of violence? How can we resist this exploitation of our inherent nature in a way that speaks to our vulnerabilities, our livedness, our freedom? This program sees these questions as points of entry to explore, without boundary, the myriad ways in which resistance feels. — Sarah-Tai Black jeny303, Laura Huertas Millán Toronto Premiere, Colombia/France, 2018, 16mm > digital, 6 min, Spanish Footage of an abandoned Bauhaus-style building accompanies confessionals from Jeny, a self-described living work of art, in this composite work and fleeting meditation on architecture and biography. Crowtrap, Callum Hill North American Premiere, Germany/UK, 2018, 35mm, 15 min, English Weaving together the lives of two men, Crowtrap draws upon their individual dealings with fire to expand across themes such as pyromania, anarchy, radicalism, and enlightenment. 77 min
Innis Town Hall University of Toronto 2 Sussex Ave
on screen Fri Apr 12 5pm
I Signed the Petition, Mahdi Fleifel UK/Germany/Switzerland, 2018, digital, 11 min, English Immediately after a Palestinian man signs an online petition, he is thrown into a panic-inducing spiral of self-doubt. Over the course of a conversation with an understanding friend, he analyzes, deconstructs, and interprets the meaning of his choice to publicly support the cultural boycott of Israel. Dislocation Blues, Sky Hopinka US, 2017, digital, 17 min, English An incomplete and imperfect portrait of reflections from Standing Rock. Cleo Keahna recounts his experiences entering, being at, and leaving the camp and the difficulties and reluctance in looking back with a clear and critical eye. Terry Running Wild describes what his camp is like, and what he hopes it will become. Giverny I (Négresse Impériale), Ja’Tovia Gary Toronto Premiere, France/US, 2017, digital, 6 min Shot on location in Claude Monet’s garden in Giverny, France, Gary’s film examines the precarious nature of Black women’s bodily integrity, the ethics of care as resistance work, and how class position shapes the contours of violence. Set against the backdrop of the West’s continued global imperialist campaigns and its historical artistic canon, this experimental video features a mélange of HD video, archival footage, and analog animation to assert an oppositional gaze in the re-telling of modern history. Sojourner, Cauleen Smith Canadian Premiere, US, 2018, digital, 22 min, English Set in Noah Purifoy’s Outdoor Desert Art Museum in Joshua Tree, California, artist Cauleen Smith reimagines this unique space as a radical feminist utopia. Among the scattered assemblages, a group of women whose dynamic, colourful outfits radiate with energy, gather to re-stage an iconic photograph of men taken by Billy May for Life Magazine in 1966. While paying homage to the feminist abolitionist Sojourner Truth, the title refers to the spiritual journey these women embark upon.
$12 general admission $6 students, seniors, underemployed
Co-presented with Inside Out Festival, Toronto Arab Film and Unit 2. Ja’Tovia Gary, Giverny I (Négresse Impériale), 2017.