Timothy Asch in Person Noted anthropologist, photographer, and ethnographic filmmaker Timothy Asch has done extensive work in Indonesia and with the Yanomami of Brazil. His newest work, Celebration of Origins (1992, 30 mins), was made in collaboration with Patsy Asch and E. Douglas Lewis. In the mountains of Eastern Flores Indonesia the Ata Tana Ai celebrate the myth of their origins, negotiating bureaucratic regulations and conflicts with Catholic beliefs. His earlier classic of the field, The Ax Fight (with Napoleon Chagnon, 1975, 30 mins) is noted for its multiple tellings of an incident in a Yanomani village. The repetitions, and the interpretations made possible by each structuring of the incident, emphasize the connection between perception and preconceptions, the difficulty of recognizing one's own conceptual models. In A Balinese Trance Seance (with Patsy Asch, Linda Connor, 1980, 30 mins), "Jero Tapakan, a spirit medium in Central Bali, is 'entered' by deities and spirits who converse with her clients. Unbeknownst to her, (they) wish to contact the spirit of their dead son to learn the cause of his death and his wishes for his cremation ceremony" (Asch). In Jero on Jero: A Balinese Trance Seance Observed (with Patsy Asch, Linda Connor, 1981, 17 mins), Jero Tapakan watches A Balinese Trance Seance for the first time; her comments provide a contrast to the film's more academic style. -Kathy Geritz