Artist in PersonOn a rare return visit to the Bay Area from Sweden, Gunvor Nelson will present a selection of her lush, painterly films at both PFA and the S.F. Cinematheque. She will also screen her most recent work, her first video, Tree-Line (1998, 8 mins). In Light Years (1987, 28 mins) Nelson re-embraced her love of painting. Ink and paint are luxuriantly applied to glass, photographs, and three-dimensional objects. Rather than a clash of styles of representation, the world, objects, and pictures meld into a series of sensual, enigmatic associations. As photographs are painted over and objects decay, a sense of loss permeates this beautiful collage, but at the same time, there is the vital sense of literally drawing on memories. In Frameline (1984, 22 mins) and Natural Features (1990, 30 mins), like Light Years part of the ongoing series Field Studies, Nelson explores the possibilities of collage animation. Fleeting images and splashes of color animate a world that is both of the past and creating a vivid present.-Kathy Geritz