Walker Art Center's Expanding The Frame Series Features Online Experimental Films by BIPOC and LGBTQ+ Artists this February

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 LGBTQ+ 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.

The Expanding the Frame virtual cinema events are free. Details on the films and artists below.

Expanding the Frame Part 1
February 2–15

Live Artist Talk with Rini Yun Keagy, Cauleen Smith, and James N. Kienitz Wilkins
February 12, 7pm CT

Expanding the Frame Part 2
February 16–March 2, 2021

Expanding the Frame Live with sound artist Jay Afrisando and interdisciplinary artist Lee Noble
February 26, 8–9pm CT

Expanding the Frame Part 1 Featured Films

The Giverny Document by Ja’Tovia Gary (Available February 2–9)
Unleashing an arsenal of techniques and materials to explore the creative virtuosity of Black femme performance figures, Gary creates a multitextured cinematic poem that meditates on the safety and bodily autonomy of Black women. 2019, 16mm to digital, 41 min.

The Violence of a Civilization Without Secrets by Adam Khalil, Zack Khalil, and Jackson Polys
Using Indigenous cinematic language, humor, and performance, this transgressive documentary reflects on Indigenous sovereignty, the undead violence of museum archives, and postmortem justice prompted by the “discovery” of the Kennewick Man. From the Ruben/Bentson Moving Image Collection. 2018, digital, 10 min.

Traveling Shoes by Kevin Jerome Everson
A record spins, a young woman poses, and elders recount their memories with the Brown Singers gospel group. Featuring Sidney Brown Sr., Robert Whitfeld, Matilda Washington, and Kimberly Knox. 2019, digital, 7 min.

My Twilight Zone Thing by Sondra Perry
The artist reenacts scenes of actors in the television show The Twilight Zone alongside appropriated footage in her split-screen performance film. 2017, digital, 2 min.

Which is Witch by Marie Losier
Louis II of Bavaria has been petrified in the ice since time immemorial. Three witch sisters try to defrost him and unravel a mystery in a colorful and surreal fairy tale. 2020, in French with English subtitles, 16mm transferred to digital, 5 min.

Lookin’ Good, Feelin’ Good by Stanya Kahn
Wearing a giant phallic costume, Kahn’s stand-up comedy routine is intercut with footage of her wandering the streets of her Los Angeles neighborhood. The artist shares her experiences with anxiety, arrogance, and vulnerability—all at the heart of her performance. 2012, digital, 5 min.

The Sausage by Hilary Harp and Suzie Silver
Based on a Swedish folk tale, The Sausage tells the humorous story of two sisters, three wishes, and a disastrous obsession with a sausage. 2015, digital, 9 min.

Live Artist Talk
February 12, 7pm
Virtual Cinema, Free

Join a conversation with some of the artists featured in the month-long Expanding the Frame program on February 12 at 7 pm. Click here to register now for this conversation with creators including Rini Yun Keagy, Cauleen Smith, and James N. Kienitz Wilkins.

Expanding the Frame Part 2
February 16–March 2, 2021
Virtual Cinema, Free

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. 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/NW) by Rini Yun Keagy
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.

Expanding the Frame Live
February 26, 8–9pm CT
Virtual Cinema, Free

Two Twin Cities–based artists team up virtually to present a spontaneous, live performance film. Musician and sound artist Jay Afrisando and interdisciplinary artist Lee Noble will collaborate from their home studios, improvising a blend of sound and moving image to create a digital film in real time.

This free virtual event will begin here at 8 pm (CST) on Friday, February 26.

About the Artists

Lee Noble is a musician, performer, and interdisciplinary artist moving between sound, video, collage, and installation. He received an MFA from Minneapolis College of Art and Design. He is the designer and cofounder of No Kings Record Co., a record label focused on field recordings, ambient, drone, and experimental music, as well as Night Club (along with Emma Beatrez), a transdisciplinary, conceptual art study and activity group.

Jay Afrisando uses sound and other media to share awareness of human-nature-technology relationships and diverse hearing profiles. He employs artistic approaches including (but not limited to) music composition, sound installation, mixed media, participatory work, improvisation, field recording, and everything in-between.