INSTALLATIONS

BUMPERS

For this year’s bumpers, local filmmaker David Wilson set out to reconnoiter our own invisible village, discovering a handful of mid-Missouri locations that serve as thresholds for the audience’s own cinematic explorations.

Liminal spaces are moments of transition (from the Latin “limen,” meaning threshold), stopovers on the journey from “before” to “next.” These spaces are haunted by their own in-between-ness; they are neither where you have come from nor where you are ultimately going. With the unknown on the horizon, the liminal is underlined by the anxiety of waiting. These spaces may be unobtrusive, but they are unavoidable—you must travel through them to reach your destination.

Unfolding over a single take, and gently infused with a creepypasta-inspired aesthetic, each bumper leans into an excavation of liminality. A necessary pause, a stolen respite, the palpable anticipation of waiting for “the thing”— we celebrate the invisible beauty of these overlooked locales. Connecting it all is the music, with neoclassical duo A Winged Victory for the Sullen lending tracks from its aptly titled album, Invisible Cities (itself the score for a multimedia dance performance based on the Italo Calvino book that helped inspire this year’s fest theme).

At True/False, bumpers exist to offer a moment of pause before every single screening of the Fest. They are not the film you have come to see, but their role in clearing the path for what’s to come is still vital. We invite you to engage in some micromeditation within our very own liminal spaces.

ART INSTALLATIONS

BOX OFFICE (Map #01)

While you are picking up your passes and browsing the T/F merch, feast your eyes on THE MARCH EXHIBIT at Sager Reeves Gallery, featuring original works in abstract painting, representational drawing, and figurative painting by contemporary American artists Lita Kenyon, Lauren Howard, and Metra Mitchell. Open to the public March 2–26.

MISSOURI THEATRE (Map #02)

CONSUME, by Missouri artist Matthew Zupnick, treats the viewer to a playful satire confronting the instability of our current geopolitical and environmental situation. This masterful thought-provoking bronze sculpture elicits laughter and invites conversation.

BLUE NOTE (Map #03)

Compositions and responses created from full-body stretches and intuitive movements, PATHS UNKNOWN by Jane Georges positions large reflective pieces along the walls of The Blue Note. As you settle into your seat, search across the theater to view these ever-changing explorations of nostalgia, intuition, and memory.

Tree, Broken Tree by Dylan Mortimer

THE PICTUREHOUSE (Map #04)

LAWN

TREE, BROKEN TREE, by Kansas City artist Dylan Mortimer, visually revives a dying tree in this sculptural manifestation of life and death. As a symbol of his own recovery after surviving two double lung transplants, this impactful sculpture combines the temporal and the spiritual in an embrace of hope. Willy Wilson’s DRAGON makes his beloved appearance as guardian and guide of the festival. A constant and enduring force, this creature continues to represent the heart of True/False.

LOBBY

Fusing physics, philosophy, and visual art, St. Louis artist Sukanya Mani explores the shift between the visible and invisible through THE OBSERVER AND THE OBSERVED. These large-scale suspended abstractions and tapestries interweave light and shadow on the ceiling and walls. As you walk around the delicately cut paper installations, experiencing how your movement and breath cause the artwork to move gently, you become immersed in visual complexity and the relationship of individual elements to each other. Anne Labovitz’s ENTANGLEMENT OF HOPE activates color, light, and energy in her large-scale paper installation. All you have to do is look up to engage in this visceral and emotional piece which challenges isolation, loneliness, and disconnection. This dramatic and unrepentantly beautiful paper sculpture explores expressions of humanity’s entanglement with hope and is a generative promises for the future.

THEATER

THE PICTUREHOUSE PORTRAIT PROJECT This larger-than-life sociology project featuring video portraits of our fellow mid-Missourians, pairs well with our music openers, and provides an almost meditative immersive experience as you sit back and wait for the next doc to begin.

Barb

HITTSVILLE (Map #06)

UPRISE GALLERY

Askia Bilal presents NON-PORTRAITS: IN-BETWEEN-BEING, a series of paintings featuring nebulous figures painted predominantly in black against vibrant colors. Exploring notions of invisibility and hypervisibility, the seen and unseen, the known and unknown, these powerful pieces raise questions and challenge perceptions of otherness and the self, creation and de(con) struction of human identity. This exhibition will open Feb. 27 and close April 10.

FIRST PRESBETYRIAN CHURCH SANCTUARY (Map #09)

Lovingly and painstakingly handcrafted with thousands of keyboard keys, everyone’s favorite buffalo, BARB, embodies the creative essence of the Fest. This corporeal spirit remains tethered to her familiar haunt in a staunch promise to return to The Globe in the future.

FORREST (Map #15)

Tree by TREE, our local metal-bending wizard, Michael Marcum, presents a series of fine handcrafted metalwork trees that has grown for many years. This year, its tendrils can be found wherever Synapses are afoot. In the theater, a moonlit birch forest glows.

PARTIES

At @CTION (MAP #18), St. Louis based artist Kiki Salem pushes the boundaries of color and design through her animated projections and woven tapestries, embracing the space and spirit of the party. Kiki’s textiles create an immersive dreamscape blended with her digital manipulations that project kaleidoscopic effects.

Certain Exclusions by Amanda Burnham

ORR STREET STUDIOS (Map #17)

True/False welcomes our Artist in Residence, Amanda Burnham. Throughout the duration of the festival, Amanda will be installing her large, site-specific drawings composed of hundreds of quick, gestural acrylic paint sketches, collaged onto the walls of Orr Street Studios Gallery. Stop in the gallery and witness the ever-changing narrative as anecdotal moments recorded and observed from her explorations of Columbia evolve to enfold idiosyncratic, personal iconography that emphasizes the darkly comic and absurd. This work, titled CERTAIN EXCLUSIONS, will be on display until March 25.

ALLEY A (Map #12)

NON-PORTRAITS- IN/BETWEEN push Askia Bilal’s NON-PORTRAITS: IN-BETWEEN-BEING (found at Uprise Gallery) into new life and meaning as they represent the invisible amongs us and within us. Digitally and mechanically reproduced and enlarged on reusable vinyl banners, these portraits are encountered as you move in the in/between space of Alley A.