I have a MFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, a certificate in Film Preservation and Restoration from The George Eastman House, and worked as an assistant editor in picture and sound...
FLAHERTY ON THE ROAD#2: CITY SYMPHONIES
Date/Time:
02/03/2012 - 7:00pm - 9:00pm
Location:
IHouse, Ibrahim Theater, 3701 Chestnut St., Philadelphia,
Cost:
FREE, IHouse members; $7, students; $9, general
Window Cleaning in Shanghai
dir. Laura Kissel, US, 2010, video, 3 mins, color, Chinese w/English subtitles
Media artist Laura Kissel describes her subjects simply as “two workers I met, hanging off the edges of my apartment building in Shanghai.” This arresting moment captures places, people, and events that suggested the qualities of everyday life in contemporary Shanghai. A work self-aware of the verité tradition it inhabits, Window Cleaning uses only location sound and defers to long takes. Yet Kissel also has a photographer’s eye for composition, structuring her window on the world in ways that are beautiful, honest, and
only occasionally ironic.
Tan Mian Hua
dir. Laura Kissel, US, 2011, video, 15 mins, color, Chinese w/ English subtitles
While documenting the contemporary textile industry in Shanghai, Kissel found the Zhu family on Chongming Island, who demonstrated the disappearing art of making a quilt with simple tools. Tan mian hua (beating cotton) is the process of assembling this type of handcrafted quilt.
Singapore GaGa
dir. Tan Pin Pin, Singapore, 2005, video, 54 mins, color, English, Mandarin and Arabic w/ English subtitles
Tan Pin Pin’s work shows a studied devotion to the audio dimension of contemporary life, particularly as experienced in her home city. Official declarations – school songs, patriotic parades – are heard in contrast to marginalized voices: a wheel chaired busker, avant-garde musicians, and the multilingual polyphony of everyday life.