MARLON RIGGS, BLACK IS...BLACK AIN'T, 1995
The final film by filmmaker Marlon Riggs, BLACK IS…BLACK AIN'T, jumps into the middle of explosive debates over Black identity. White Americans have always stereotyped African Americans. But the rigid definitions of "Blackness" that African Americans impose on each other, Riggs claims, have also been devastating…
SARA KATHRYN ARLEDGE, WHAT IS A MAN?, 1958
What Is a Man?, whose bemused shrug at that big question manages to encompass onscreen text, preexisting art, time-lapse and science photography, dance, documentary scenes, advertising satire, rhyme, song, even a game of musical chairs…
SHIGEKO KUBOTA, DUCHAMPIANA: NUDE DESCENDING A STAIRCASE, 1976
Inspired by Duchamp's study of motion in his painting, Nude descending a staircase (1912), Kubota uses video to explore movement and temporality. In this single-channel combination of color video, color-synthesized video, and color Super-8 film transferred to video…
LYNN HERSHMAN LEESON, SEDUCTION OF A CYBORG, 1994
Lynn Hershman Leeson has been exploring the impact and potential of nascent technologies in relation to gender, sexuality, and disembodiment for more than 50 years. Her video Seduction of a Cyborg from 1994 presents technology as an infectious disease women are seduced into: The protagonist, a blind woman, agrees to physical treatment that allows her to see images via computer-screen transmission…
LIS RHODES, LIGHT READING, 1978
Lis Rhodes is a filmmaker and founding member of the women’s film and video distribution company Circles, established in 1979. Many of her films employ a primarily abstract language. Rhodes’s film, Light Reading, begins in darkness. A woman’s voice reads extracts of text by the American Modernist writer Gertrude Stein…
CAMERON A. GRANGER, DREAM DROP DISTANCE
In Dream Drop Distance, Granger uses the histories embodied in karaoke and soul train lines to weave us a new possible future on the other side of disaster. Two custom karaoke booths and their playlists invite visitors to undertake impromptu duets with one another, opening themselves up to the indeterminacies of encounter…
LAURIE ANDERSON, HABEAS CORPUS, 2015
Iconic performance artist Laurie Anderson expands upon her work fusing storytelling and technology, creating an installation and performance piece that examines lost identity, memory, and the resiliency of the human body and spirit...
EBONY G. PATTERSON,... THREE KINGS WEEP ..., 2018
Ebony G. Patterson uses lavish surfaces and verdant motifs to entice viewers to contemplate not only the power of beauty and fashion but also historical and contemporary violence against Black people. In . . . three kings weep . . ., a trio of young men shed tears as they sit silently before a backdrop of floral wallpaper and fluttering artificial butterflies...
CRAIG HIGHBERGER, SUPERSTAR IN A HOUSEDRESS, 2004
Jackie Curtis is not a drag queen. Jackie is an artist. A pioneer without a frontier." -- Andy Warhol. Superstar in a Housedress examines the life and legend of Warhol transvestite superstar Jackie Curtis who was a poet, playwright, performer, and one of the great personalities of his time...
NESRINE KHODR, I SWAM IN THE SEA LAST WEEK, 2003
I Swam in the Sea Last Week is a symbolic and poetic video evoking a changing situation through a female body swimming in the sea...
KERRY TRIBE, UNTITLED (POTENTIAL TERRORIST), 2002
In November 2001, a casting notice for (Untitled) Potential Terrorist ran in Backstage West, an L.A-based movie industry trade magazine and actors’ resource, requesting submissions for an untitled, silent, experimental film...
SHELLY SILVER, WE, 1990
Even as the text instructs us otherwise, it is impossible not to read We's two images - that is, to respond to their symbolic quality, their suggestiveness. In a stream of associations, the rhythmic flow of people on the left becomes an ejaculation while the rhythmic hand on the right marks detachment, self-centeredness...
THERESA HAK KYUNG CHA, MOUTH TO MOUTH, 1975
English and Korean words appear on the screen, a mouth forms the shape of an "O," then opens and closes. Is this the beginning of language? In this early videotape, Cha isolates and repeats a simple, physical act — a mouth forming the eight Korean vowel graphemes — so that this ordinary action becomes something primal and riveting…
SIR ISAAC JULIEN, LESSONS OF THE HOUR, 2019
Lessons of the Hour is a poetic meditation on the life and times of Frederick Douglass, the ten-screen film installation proposes a contemplative journey into Douglass' zeitgeist and its relationship to contemporaneity…
JOEL MEYEROWITZ, POP
Pop chronicles the journey of three generations of Meyerowitz men on a road trip from Florida to the Bronx, in exploration of their familial roots…
NATHAN MILLER, INSIDE-OUT
Installed at a historical fort, Inside-Out was an examination and open forum on violence in relation to the human spirit…
RASHID JOHNSON, THE NEW BLACK YOGA, 2011
New York-based Rashid Johnson explores complex cultural identities and issues relevant to being African American in the present day. The artist’s recent ventures in film make use of the medium’s ability to express meaning through movement…
THE DEATH AND LIFE OF MARSHA P. JOHNSON, 2017
Victoria Cruz investigates the mysterious 1992 death of black gay rights activist and Stonewall veteran, Marsha P. Johnson. Using archival interviews with Johnson, and new interviews with Johnson's family, friends and fellow activists…
DAVID WOJNAROWICZ, A FIRE IN MY BELLY, 1986-87
Echoing themes explored throughout David Wojnarowicz's art and writing, A Fire in My Belly is a visceral meditation on cultural and individual identity, spirituality, and belief systems. On a trip to Mexico City with Tommy Turner to scout Day of the Dead imagery, Wojnarowicz shot 25 rolls of super-8 film, documenting scenes that embodied the violence of city life…
FEMALE SENSIBILITY, LYNDA BENGLIS, 1973,
Two women, faces framed in tight focus, kiss and caress. Their interaction is silent, muted by Benglis' superimposition of a noisy, distracting soundtrack of appropriated AM radio…