November 22nd, 2014
@ the Museum of Human Achievement
7:30pm
$5-$10 Suggested Donation
Presented as part of the EAST AUSTIN STUDIO TOUR!
“A poet’s journey though corridors of liquid geometry where words float and echoes are visual; where portals open onto morphing gardens with unlimited horizons.” – Mike Kuchar
“The interaction between your visions, the music (fantastical), and the wandering improvisers — a 21st century Dante and Beatrice adrift in the shifting rising falling swirling cacophony of the Collective Unconscious — achieve a sly sophistication of rhythmic cohesion as startling as it is graceful.” – Antero Alli
Experimental Response Cinema and the Museum of Human Achievement is excited to screen SUGGESTIVE GESTURES, with NYC-based filmmaker David Finkelstein in-person! This screening will also feature a short film by Austin-based animation powerhouse Jeanne Stern: The Oracle of Ambrosia.
The Oracle of Ambrosia by Jeanne Stern
9 min / digital / sound / 2014
Ambrosia Networks offers a selection of high-quality programs and promotional information, beamed to your nearest reflecting pool. In this week’s episode, “Centaur Problems,” our very own Oracle of Ambrosia responds to a question about quadrupedal men, the women who love them, and wedding etiquette.
Featuring performances by Matthew “Ambrosia” Terrell & Jeanne “Centaurophile” Stern. Music by Steve Arceri.
Suggestive Gestures by David Finkelstein
75 min / digital / sound / 2013
Traveling along the path of a labyrinth, the viewer passes through a series of extremely diverse landscapes, which are created through lush animation, evocative orchestral music, and rich dialog, in which words are used as much for rhythm and texture as they are for meaning. A man and woman guide us on this trip, taking us past gently falling Mondrian paintings, violent car crashes and bombing raids, and a pair of dancing, multicolored boxes, among many other settings. Based on an improvised performance, SUGGESTIVE GESTURES leads us gradually and indirectly towards a mysterious animal, hiding in the center of the maze.
Suggestive Gestures: Trailer from David Finkelstein on Vimeo.
David Finkelstein has been making performances since 1982. He has been developing a style of improvised performance work since 1993, which he has performed at Here, Theater for the New City, the Brooklyn Arts Exchange, Movement Research at the Judson Church, PS 122, The Knitting Factory, New York Improvisation Festival, and many other venues. He has taught Improvisation Technique for 3 years at Movement Research, where he was Artist in Residence in 1997. His work has been funded by The Fund for Creative Communities, The Field, Movement Research, meet the Composer, The Brooklyn Arts Exchange, BACA, and many individual donors. His video work has been featured in the PBS series “Under the Pink Carpet,” the OMA Awards, the PrideVision cable network, and numerous film festivals and screening events.
Jeanne Stern creates bizarre cinematic worlds using a hybrid of animation, puppetry, and dioramas. She earned her MFA in Film at the University of Texas in Austin (2007), and she recently completed an artist residency at the Atlantic Center for the Arts with filmmaker Charles Atlas. Her work has shown internationally in venues including SXSW, the Smithsonian, the Athens Video Art Festival, and Heather Henson’s touring film festival Handmade Puppet Dreams. She has also taught courses in experimental animation for UT Austin in Portugal, and at the Austin School of Film.