22/11/2023 19h00
Cinematek
Baron Horta 9, 1000 Brussels
Curve the Night Sky (2021, 5') - Peggy Ahwesh
The summer of 2020 I spent most nights outdoors alone transfixed by the theater of the stars and the dance of the fireflies. My sense of time expanded and slowed but the time-lapse camera condenses and speeds up the experience, in seeming contradiction.
Kansas Atlas (2019, 15’) - Peggy Ahwesh
Border Control (2019, 4’) - Peggy Ahwesh
The infamous Trump prototypes of the wall are Eight large slabs of concrete and metal standing in a row along the border near San Diego. Monolithic and stately. Sculpture? Symbols? We viewed them from the Mexican side - on the edge of a very poor neighborhood- which offered a great, close view of the structures. The wall there being a low corrugated metal fence that opened onto a wide swath ‘no man’s land’ on the American side. In the small amount of time there, we met a fellow from Ghana who asked if over the fence was America? Yes, sort of. He then jumped over and disappeared onto the American side. We were witness to a direct act of intention and desperation and also an act of optimism for the future. It seemed so absurd and improbable that it happened so simply that to meditate on it’s meaning and recognize the folly of the border policy, became psychedelic.
The summer of 2020 I spent most nights outdoors alone transfixed by the theater of the stars and the dance of the fireflies. My sense of time expanded and slowed but the time-lapse camera condenses and speeds up the experience, in seeming contradiction.
Kansas Atlas (2019, 15’) - Peggy Ahwesh
Constructed of aerial footage of small towns and vistas, this split-screen essay film pairs Peggy Ahwesh’s images of the region with text by Marianne Shaneen, which borrows from Michel Foucault, Donna Haraway, and other social theorists.
Border Control (2019, 4’) - Peggy Ahwesh
The infamous Trump prototypes of the wall are Eight large slabs of concrete and metal standing in a row along the border near San Diego. Monolithic and stately. Sculpture? Symbols? We viewed them from the Mexican side - on the edge of a very poor neighborhood- which offered a great, close view of the structures. The wall there being a low corrugated metal fence that opened onto a wide swath ‘no man’s land’ on the American side. In the small amount of time there, we met a fellow from Ghana who asked if over the fence was America? Yes, sort of. He then jumped over and disappeared onto the American side. We were witness to a direct act of intention and desperation and also an act of optimism for the future. It seemed so absurd and improbable that it happened so simply that to meditate on it’s meaning and recognize the folly of the border policy, became psychedelic.
From Romance to Ritual (1985, 20') - Peggy Ahwesh
"From Romance to Ritual invokes and inverts the title of the 1920 book by Jessie L. Weston, as it like the book, draws connections between pagan history and ritual and mythology.
"This film is formed around several scenes of women telling stories to the camera of their sexual history and experience. This material is juxtaposed with related footage concerning girls and their growing up, memory and the learning process and the received truth of history lessons. This film as a whole makes for an uncomfortable fit between women's personal experience and the official dogma of our culture's history.
"The filming style is of the ethnographic film without the expert observer and of the home movie without the father." — Peggy Ahwesh
The Summer Triangle (2023, 5') - Peggy Ahwesh
A companion work to Curve the Night Sky.
"From Romance to Ritual invokes and inverts the title of the 1920 book by Jessie L. Weston, as it like the book, draws connections between pagan history and ritual and mythology.
"This film is formed around several scenes of women telling stories to the camera of their sexual history and experience. This material is juxtaposed with related footage concerning girls and their growing up, memory and the learning process and the received truth of history lessons. This film as a whole makes for an uncomfortable fit between women's personal experience and the official dogma of our culture's history.
"The filming style is of the ethnographic film without the expert observer and of the home movie without the father." — Peggy Ahwesh
The Summer Triangle (2023, 5') - Peggy Ahwesh
A companion work to Curve the Night Sky.