Archival Propaganda in Film: A Screening with Mariam Ghani and Jen Liu
Where: Asia Art Archive in America
43 Remsen St.
718-522-2299 Price: By donation
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Join us for a screening program of two films that contain portions of, or are inspired by, government propaganda. The screening will be followed by a discussion with the artists on their connection to the original works and how their re-contextualization can both excavate suppressed histories for new audiences, and also further blur the line between truth and fiction.
Mariam Ghani will screen selections from her upcoming documentary What We Left Unfinished, the mostly true story of five unfinished feature films from the Communist era in Afghanistan (1978-1991). By looking at a period when films were weaponized by political regimes and filmmakers became targets for opposition attacks, What We Left Unfinished asks: if nations are fictional inventions, can fiction films reinvent them?
The Pink Detachment (2015) is Jen Liu‘s reinterpretation of The Red Detachment of Women (1970), a Model Opera ballet from China’s Cultural Revolution. In the original, a peasant girl joins an all-female military detachment, takes revenge on her despotic landlord, and produces Revolution. Can such a fraught archival document be re-motivated, beyond kitsch? This piece proposes that re-motivation is possible, but only through major revision.
This event will be filmed, by attending you consent to be filmed.
Your registration helps us to gauge attendance for this program, but please note that it does not guarantee seating. Reserved seating at this program will be on a first-come, first-served basis. The doors open at 6:30pm and the program begins at 7:00pm.