This year’s virtual Expanding the Frame presents groundbreaking experimental works from the past decade that explore modes of performance in film and dynamic relationships between camera and artist. Variously playful, pointed, and poignant, the month-long program highlights work by BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ artists who are expanding the boundaries of performance and film. Included in the series are several titles recently acquired for the Walker’s Ruben/Bentson Moving Image collection. Total runtime: 81 minutes.
Contains mature content.
Expanding the Frame Part 2 Featured Films
Crow Requiem by Cauleen Smith
The crow is a metaphorical thread tying together the Underground Railroad, the invention of the stereoscope, and the first prison electrocution in upstate New York. Smith’s bluesy requiem pays tribute to the intelligent victims of harassment as targeted souls, forced to migrate. 2015, digital, 11 min.
Best Year Ever by James N. Kienitz Wilkins
In the children’s book Best Busy Year Ever by Richard Scarry, the hustle and bustle of a city is captured through colorful illustrations. Using his performative storytelling narration, Wilkins questions contemporary social issues with understated ironic wit. World premiere. 2020, super 16mm transferred to digital, 14 min.
Instructions on How to Make a Film by Nazli Dinçel
The director performs an educational voiceover about the nature of performance and “refusing the logic of narrative” in a multilayered film that includes laser-cut animated text and cinematic visions of farming. 2018, 16mm transferred to digital, 13 min.
Alteres by Colectivo Los Ingrávidos
Using performative movements, the camera celebrates small shrines and affirms traditions of ritual and dance. 2019, 16mm transferred to digital, 3 min.
Ordinal (SW/NE) by Rini Yun Keagy with Miljohn Ruperto
A far-reaching arc traces the cultural and environmental influences of a soil-dwelling, pathogenic fungus and its associated disease, valley fever, in California’s Central Valley. 2018, digital, 40 min.
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