HIJACK MAKING DANCES: Part 2 (2017) Thursday, June 8, 7pm, free
Bentson Mediatheque
Intrepid dance duo HIJACK (Kristin Van Loon and Arwen Wilder) return for the second installment of HIJACK Making Dances in the Bentson Mediatheque. The duo will create dances in response to a selection of films from the Ruben/ Bentson Moving Image Collection. Specializing in the inappropriate, HIJACK play with audience expectations through the unconventional interpretation of the small cinema space.
Moving Image Commissions Launch
Online Launch June 15
The Walker Moving Image Commissions returns for a second season this summer. Four artists-Marwa Arsanios, Yto Barrada, Pauline Boudry/Renate Lorenz, and Renée Green-have each been commissioned to create a new moving image work to view and premiere online from June-September 2017. Their works respond to the inspirations, inquiry, and influence of Harun Farocki (1944-2014), a key artist in the Walker’s Ruben/Bentson Moving Image Collection.
Farocki’s prolific output as a filmmaker, writer, activist and teacher is characterized by its incisive and sustained critique of media habits and its effect on everyday lives. From the relationships between computer gaming and mass militarization, to the role of research as a form of politics, Farocki’s work developed intertextual relationships between the occupations of artist, documentarian, editor and analyst.
The second season of the Walker Moving Image Commissions responds to Farocki’s ongoing cultural legacy. Drawing together an array of footage, photographs and texts from archival and contemporary sources, these four artists each deal with ideas of experience as unclaimed, collective or invisible.
The Walker Moving Image Commissions are generously supported by the Bentson Foundation. Additionally, Boudry/Lorenz’ commission is co-curated by Alhena Katsof and produced with Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC) at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy; Participant Inc., New York; and the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston (CAMH), in partnership with the Goethe-Institute New York, with support from ProHelvetia.
Mason Leaver-Yap’s Crosscuts essay
Monterey Pop
Friday, June 16, 7:30 pm
Saturday, June 17, 2pm and 7:30pm
“With his characteristic vérité style, D. A. Pennebaker captured it all, immortalizing moments that have become legend” -Criterion
Revel in the sounds from the “Summer of Love” with the 4K restoration of Monterey Pop, D. A. Pennebaker’s groundbreaking documentary that inaugurated the next movement in rock history.
Featuring performances by The Mamas and the Papas, Simon and Garfunkel, Canned Heat, The Who, Jimi Hendrix, Ravi Shankar, and many more, Monterey Pop is the next best thing to traveling back in time to 1967. Director: D. A. Pennebaker, Country of Origin: US, Run Time: 78 minutes. Language: English
Reviews
Huffington Post, Pennebaker on Pop, 2007
Reshaping Our World: Cinema without Borders
Wednesdays, July 5, 12, 19, and 26; August 2, 7:30 pm $10 ($8 Walker members, students, and seniors)
Series pass for all screenings: $30
Walker Cinema
“Images capture our world, but they also help to create it by providing shapes and textures and informing how we engage with people, politics, and everyday life. In this film series, we bring images from the past and present to the screen, pictures of people and places in the Middle East and Africa that imagine the world we want to live in, while also reflecting the one we already know.” -Michelle Baroody, Arab Film Festival director
As global borders close and millions are displaced, the Walker Cinema’s summer film series Reshaping our World: Cinema without Borders considers the world’s restricted landscapes and people, those currently threatened by war, international intervention, and xenophobia. In solidarity with the majority Muslim countries recently targeted by US foreign policy and the immigrants and refugees from Minnesota communities, Mizna -an Arab American arts organization- joins with Walker Moving Image to screen films from Africa and the Middle East. The program draws from the rich tradition of filmmaking in these regions-both classic and contemporary films that redefine and reshape the landscape of stereotyped representations through cinematic technique and storytelling. Celebrating Arab, Afro-Arab, and Iranian cinema on Wednesday nights in July and August, the series will include classics such as Tewfik Saleh’s Syrian-Egyptian masterwork, The Dupes (Al-makhdu’un, 1972) and contemporary films such as Musa Syeed’s A Stray (2016) as well as short films from Iraq, Libya, Yemen, Somalia, and Sudan.
A Stray
Wednesday, July 5, 7:30 pm
Director: Musa Syeed
“In addition to being a tender film about a man finding redemption in caring for a canine, Syeed’s pious film is refreshing, showing us a corner of America that we never see.”
–Roger Ebert
The opening night of Reshaping our World: Cinema without Borders presents local stories and artistic vision from our Somalian-American community in Minneapolis. Starring a largely local cast, A Stray is the story of a young Somalian-American down on his luck in Minneapolis. The film follows Adan as he roams the streets of Minneapolis looking for direction in life, which plays out through the forging of friendship with a stray dog. 2016, in English, 82 minutes.
A Stray is preceded by a screening of Rumee, a documentary shorts series created by emerging local voices in our Somali community that share refugee stories from a strength based perspective. Works by Hamse Warfa, Halima Aden, Suud Olat, and Mohamed Warsame tell personal stories of cultural integration, resettlement, and activism from youth community.
Awards
Best MN-Made Narrative Feature at MSPIFF 2016; won Scriptwriting Award at Indie Memphis Film Festival 2016; nominated Narrative Feature, SXSW Grand Jury Award 2016.
The Dupes (Al-makhdu’un)
Wednesday, July 12, 7:30 pm
Director: Tewfik Saleh
Based on Ghassan Kanafani’s short story, “Men in the Sun,” Saleh’s The Dupes depicts the story of three Palestinian exiles as they look for a smuggler to take them to Kuwait where the promise of work and prosperity lead to a deadly race against time. Set in Iraq, but shot in Syria, Saleh’s classic film captures beautiful scenery and engaging performances from its lead characters. 1973, in Arabic with English subtitles, 107 minutes.
Awards
Tanit d’Or at Carthage Film Festival 1972; nominated Golden Prize at Moscow International Film Festival 1973
The Cow
Wednesday, July 19, 7:30 pm
Director: Dariush Mehrjui
Largely considered the first film of the Iranian New Wave, The Cow (Gav) portrays villager Masht Hassan’s unraveling from reality after the loss of his beloved cow. Awarded the FIPRESCI Prize at the 32nd Venice International Film Festival in 1971, The Cow is a landmark of Iranian cinema that reflects the reality and hardships of life in rural Iran. 1969, in Persian with English subtitles, 105 minutes.
Awards
OCIC Award at Berlin International Film Festival 1972; won FIPRESCI Prize at Venice Film Festival 1971; nominated Gold Hugo at Chicago International Film Festival 1971
Trapped in the Scene: short films
Wednesday, July 26, 7:30 pm
The stories of shifting landscapes and displacement, told through cinematic works from Libya,
Iraq, Yemen, and Syria, demonstrate the effects of foreign interests and imperial projects on those living within the contested borders of the Middle East.
Amal’s Garden
Director: Nadia Shihab
Amal’s Garden is an intimate and telling cinematic portrait of an elderly Turkmen couple who decide to renovate their home, an act symbolizing their commitment to continuing the long life they have led together in Northern Iraq, in the shadows of war as part of an ethnic minority. 2012, in Turkish with English subtitles, 32 minutes.
Nesma’s Birds
Director: Najwan Ali and Medoo Ali
At odds with the world after her father’s death, Nesma escapes to the rooftop and secretly cares for the birds he left behind. 2013, in Arabic with English subtitles, 8 minutes.
Poet of the Sea
Director: Farag Akwedir
Part of the Libya in Motion documentary series, Poet of the Sea was shot in Benghazi in 2012. The short documentary film depicts the community’s reliance on the sea, and those who catch and prepare fish for market. 2012, in Arabic with English subtitles, 5 minutes.
The Mosque
Director: Farag Al-Sharif
Part of the Libya in Motion documentary series, this film portrays the beauty of one mosque in Tripoli through the eyes of the building’s dedicated caretaker. 2015, in Arabic with English subtitles, 5 minutes.
Karama Has No Walls
Director: Sara Ishaq
Set amidst the 2011 Yemeni uprising, this Oscar-nominated short documentary takes on the atrocities of Juma’at al-karama (Friday of Dignity) during which peaceful protestors were shot by pro-government snipers. Marking the loss of those gunned down that day, the film provides a space for the protestors’ stories. 2012, in Arabic with English subtitles, 26 minutes.
Awards
Scottish Short Film Award at Glasgow Short Film Festival 2013; nominated Best Documentary, Short Subjects Oscar at Academy Awards 2014
The Forgotten (Al-Mansiyun)
Director: Ehab Tarabieh
With the help of a smuggler, Mustafa crosses the Israeli border into the Golan Heights, where he was forced from his home decades before. Now an old man, he is unable to remember the landscape of his former country. 2012, in Arabic with English Subtitles, 21 minutes.
Awards
Best Narrative Short Film 2012 at Doha Tribeca Film Festival (Qatar) Jury Prize/ 2013 at Jerusalem International Film Festival (Paelstine) Best Features Film & Best Cinematographer & Best Video 2014 at Tech-Ex Cup Contest 2014 (Shandong, Ho)
Taste of Cherry
Wednesday, August 2, 7:30 pm
Preceded by: Human Being (Al Insan)
Director: Ibrahim Shaddad
A Sudanese shepherd leaves his wife and herd to resettle in a nearby city. Shot entirely without dialogue, this experimental short’s use of sound enhances the emotional turmoil of alienation. 1994, on 35mm, no dialogue, 27 minutes.
Taste of Cherry
Director: Abbas Kiarostami
Winner of the 1997 Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, Taste of Cherry is an intriguing meditation on life and death as a man on the brink of suicide searches for someone to bury his body. Abbas Kiarostami participated in the Walker Dialogue and Retrospective in 1997. 1997, in Persian with English subtitles, 95 minutes.
Awards
Palme d’Or at Cannes Film Festival 1997; BSFC Award for Best Foreign Language Film at Boston Society of Film Critics Awards 1998; NSFC Award for Best Foreign Language Film at National Society of Film Critics Awards 1999
MNTV 2017: On the Big Screen
Thursday, August 3, 7 pm Free
Filmmakers in Person
Walker Cinema
For more than two decades, the collaboration between the Independent Filmmaker Project Minnesota (IFP MN), Twin Cities Public Television (TPT), and the Walker Art Center has celebrated the talented local film community. MNTV 2017-two one-hour programs of short works-was first broadcast on TPT in May and will now be screened at the Walker. Join many of the filmmakers in the Cinema and at the reception that follows.
Program 1
John Akre, The Day Truffaut Died
Jila Nikpay, Dreaming with Lola
Mike Hazard, We Go to the Garden
Nicholas Nerburn, 13 Roads in Otter Tail County
Lyle Corbine, Shinaab
Joshua Carlon, Love Is: A Message from Uganda’s Gay and Transgender Community
Xiaolu Wang, Xiaolu
Prakshi Malik, Neelam (Dreams)
E.G. Bailey, New Neighbors
Program 2
Ann Prim, Viktor
Cadence Nelson, Solar Flare
Rahul Chakrabarti, Color of Fear
Colin Stanhill, U-Land
Preston Sternson, A Perfect Record
Beth Peloff, The Legend of Cyril
Chris Jopp, MEOW
MNTV is made possible by generous support from the Jerome Foundation.
Ongoing
Benston Mediatheque Self-Select Cinema
Tuesday-Sunday, opens 12 noon Free
The Bentson Mediatheque offers a cinema experience unique to the Walker. Choose from more than 250 titles from the Ruben/ Bentson Moving Image Collection or watch one of the specially curated playlists. It’s all at your fingertips via touchscreen controls and projected onto the big screen with quality digital image and sound.
Major support to preserve, digitize, and present the Ruben/ Bentson Moving Image Collection is generously provided by the Bentson Foundation.
Walker Moving Image Tickets:
Tickets are avaiable online and are available at walkerart.org/tickets or by calling 612.375.7600
Address: Walker Art Center, 725 Vineland Place, Minneapolis