A listing of tours and conversations with contemporary artists and filmmakers, curators' talks, musical performances, lectures, and special events coming up at BAM/PFA.

Monthly Events

First Impressions: Free First Thursdays at BAM/PFA
Infatuation, discovery, surprise, epiphany – all start with a first impression. Get acquainted with an inspiring world of art and film on Free First Thursdays during the first week of every month. Encounter the work of artists, filmmakers, and scholars who shape our cultural landscape, or take a second look at visual culture from across time and around the world. GAP is proud to support First Impressions: Free First Thursdays at BAM/PFA.

Guided Tours of Jeanne Dunning: Study after Untitled
Tours led by UC graduate students will be offered on selected Thursdays and Sundays.

Events Listed by Calendar Date

Thursday, January 12
7:00 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening – Nightly Dreams with Bruce Loeb on Piano.
Naruse's early melodrama of a woman abandoned is a virtuoso display of camerawork and startling montage. With Flunky, Work Hard!, a lower-middle-class comedy that veers abruptly into tragedy. Part of the series Mikio Naruse.

Saturday, January 14
7:00 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening – Street Without End with Judith Rosenberg on Piano.
With its sharp class awareness, feminist concerns, and richness of melodramatic incident, this silent saga about the loves of a waitress is classic Naruse. Part of the series Mikio Naruse.

Sunday, January 15
5:30 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening – Not Blood Relations with Judith Rosenberg on Piano.
With a script by Kogo Noda, writer of many Ozu films, this is a compassionate and psychologically acute portrait of a woman trying to win back the daughter she gave up for adoption long ago. Part of the series Mikio Naruse.

Wednesday, January 18
3:00 p.m., PFA Theater
Lecture – Introduction to Film Language
Lecture by Russell Merritt. Part of the series Film 50.

Saturday, January 21
1:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m., PFA Theater
Campus Connection – Speaking Pacific (a poetic fete)
Korean and American poets will "speak Pacific" in celebration of one hundred years of Korean modern poetry at a program featuring American poets Robert Hass, Brenda Hillman, George Lakoff, Zack Rogow, and Jerome Rothenberg along with Korean poets Ko Un, Kim Nam-jo, O Sae-Young, Hwang Dong-kyu, Shin Dal-ja, Kim Jong-hae, Lee Geun-bae, and others.

Sunday, January 22
12:00 and 2:30 p.m., PFA Theater
Film Festival and Artists' Talk – Screenagers
Bay Area High School Film Festival. Part of the series Screenagers.

Wednesday, January 25
12:00 p.m., Gallery 2
Artist's Talk – Jeanne Dunning
In a walkthrough of her exhibition Study After Untitled, Jeanne Dunning will discuss the ways in which her photographic and video works have engaged with the terrain of the human body.

3:00 p.m., PFA Theater
Lecture – Movies in the Nickelodeon Era with Russell Merritt and Frederick Hodges on Piano.
Lecture by Russell Merritt. Part of the series Film 50.

7:30 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening – La Lucha: The Struggle with Duncan Macleod, John Gulager, and Jason Blalock in Person.
With its exotic masks, drag personas, and gloves-off ethos, the Mexican wrestling variant called lucha libre is right at home in Southern California, as this doc attests. With Blalock's Oakland Raider Parking Lot. Part of the series Weird America.

Sunday, January 29
2:00 p.m., Gallery 2
Guided Tour of Jeanne Dunning: Study After Untitled

Tuesday, January 31
7:30 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening – Making History in Avant-Garde Film with introduction and Booksigning by Jeffrey Skoller.
Skoller's new book Shadows, Specters, Shards was acclaimed by Yvonne Rainer as "a passionate and close reading of a body of previously neglected [films] revealed to be at the cutting edge of some of the most significant social and intellectual debates of the last three decades." We present two examples: Ernie Gehr's Eureka, refilming a century-ago trip down Market Street, and El Día Que Me Quieras by Leandro Katz, deconstructing a notorious photo of Che Guevara. Part of the series Alternative Visions.

Wednesday, February 1
3:00 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening– By The Law with lecture by Russell Merritt and Joel Adlen on Piano.
Part of the series Film 50.

FREE First Thursday
Thursday, February 2
5:30 p.m., Gallery 2
Guided Tour of Jeanne Dunning: Study After Untitled

5:30 p.m., PFA Theater
Free Screening – Al'leesi…An African Actress with introduction by Lisa Marie Rollins
The history of African Cinema as told through the rebellious life of Zalika Souley, the first professional African actress.

Friday, February 3
9:05 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening – The Colonial Misunderstanding with intoduction by LaToya Beck
European colonialism is exposed in Jean-Marie Teno's documentary about Germany's activities in Namibia, including their first use of concentration camps.

Sunday, February 5
1:00 p.m., PFA Theater
Free Screening – Pare Lorentz's The River.
In conjunction with Wilhelm Sasnal's MATRIX exhibition, BAM/PFA presents a screening of Pare Lorentz's 1938 film The River. Featuring a magnificent score by Virgil Thompson and a free-verse script by Lorentz himself (the basis for the book that inspired Wilhelm Sasnal). Lorentz's documentary on the Mississippi is widely considered a masterwork of American nonfiction filmmaking; its images of the great flood of 1937 and its sharp commentary on the poverty of the region give it renewed relevance today. The free screening at the PFA Theater will also include Sasnal's film for MATRIX.

2:00 p.m., Gallery 2
Guided Tour of Jeanne Dunning: Study After Untitled

Wednesday, February 8
3:00 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening – The Fall of the House of Usher with lecture by Russell Merritt and Joel Adlen on Piano.
With Guy Maddin short The Heart of the World. Part of the series Film 50.

Thursday, February 9
12:15 p.m., Gallery 2
Guided Tour of Jeanne Dunning: Study After Untitled

Friday, February 10 & 11
9:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m., Museum Theater
Symposium – The Bancroft Library at 100: A Celebration, 1906–2006
Historians, scientists, writers, independent scholars, curators, and fine printers come together in this two-day symposium to celebrate the centennial of The Bancroft Library. Panel topics will include early California voyages and explorations, ancient Egypt, perceptions of California, local literary history, biotechnology, the environment, the Gold Rush, social protest, Mark Twain, and other subjects encompassed by The Bancroft's collections.

Saturday. February 11
12 noon, Gallery 4
Curator's Talk – Anthony Bliss
As the first in an ongoing series of talks about objects in the Bancroft centennial exhibition, Anthony Bliss, curator of rare books and literary manuscripts at The Bancroft, offers a personal and informal tour of the exhibition for museum visitors.

Tuesday, February 14
7:30 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening– Films by Peter Tscherkassky with Peter Tscherkassky in Person.
"Tscherkassky, strictly working in film as he has done for over two decades, continues to employ celluloid as a singular material with which to investigate theories of subjectivity, memory, and perception, as well as the aesthetic limits of the cinematographic image. Tscherkassky sculpts with time and space, rhythms and arrhythmia in a way that feels like an entirely new film space, a new language altogether."-Senses of Cinema. Part of the series Alternative Visions.

Wednesday, February 15
3:00 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening– All Quiet on the Western Front with lecture by Russell Merritt.
Part of the series Film 50.

7:30 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening– Born in a Barn with Antonia Kao in Person.
Elizabeth Elson's Born in a Barn takes us into the world of ponyplay, a fetish in which enthusiasts role-play as human ponies and handlers. About finding an identity in the pursuit of an unconventional desire, "Elson's delightful doc is an intimate and affectionate look at this unusual, close-knit community."-S.F. Independent Film Festival. With Kao's short Pup. Part of the series Weird America.

Thursday, February 16
12:15 p.m., Gallery 2
Guided Tour of Jeanne Dunning: Study after Untitled

Friday, February 17
8:50 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening – Niiwam with introduction by Alassane Paap Sow
A fisherman journeys from his small Senegalese village to the big city in search of aid for his dying child in a "simple but moving portrait of a modern tragedy" (London Film Festival). Based on the novel by Ousmane Sembene.

Sunday, February 19
2:00 p.m., Gallery 2
Guided Tour of Jeanne Dunning: Study After Untitled

3:00 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening – The Troubles We've Seen: A History of Journalism in Wartime with introduction by Professor Mark Danner.
In 1993, Marcel Ophuls (The Sorrow and the Pity) went to Sarajevo to record journalists at work in a city under siege; the result was this acclaimed four-hour documentary, unreleased in the U.S. until last year. Part of the Human Rights Watch series.

Wednesday, February 22
3:00 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening – The Murderers Are Among Us with lecture by Russell Merritt.
Part of the series Film 50.

7:30 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening – Plagues & Pleasures on the Salton Sea with Chris Metzler in Person.
Narrated by John Waters, this documentary dives into Southern California's Salton Sea to explore the ecology, history, and culture that have developed around this saline sinkhole. Variety called it "jaunty and fun . . .Part of the series Weird America.

Thursday, February 23
12:15 p.m., Gallery 5
Curator's Talk: Lucinda Barnes on Measure of Time

7:30 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening -- Mardi Gras: Made in China with introducion by Professor Orville Schell David Redmon's exposé of the links between Third World labor and First World leisure follows the "bead trail" from a Chinese factory to Bourbon Street during Mardi Gras. Part of the Human Rights Watch series.

Friday, February 24
8:35 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening – Justice with introduction by Nancy Scheper-Hughes
The corridors of power are illuminated in Maria Ramos's fly-on-the-wall portrait of the judged and the judging in a Brazilian criminal court. Part of the Human Rights Watch series.

Sunday, February 26
2:00 p.m., Gallery 2
Guided Tour of Jeanne Dunning: Study After Untitled

3:30 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening -- Living Rights with introduction by Rachel Shigekane
Duco Tellegen's emotionally rich, visually striking documentary sensitively portrays three young people on three continents with nothing in common but a struggle to survive. Part of the Human Rights Watch series.

5:30 p.m., PFA Theater
Screening -- Videoletters, Program 2 with introduction by Eric Stover.
Eric van den Broek and Katarina Rejger's extraordinary project allows people in the republics of the former Yugoslavia, separated by the bloody conflict, to send video messages to one another. Part of the Human Rights Watch series. Three letters are to be shown on Sunday, February 24, and three will be presented tonight.

Tuesday, February 28
7:30 p.m., PFA Theater
Digital Film Event with introduction and booksigning by Trinh T. Minh-ha.
To commemorate the publication of Trinh's most recent book, we present a selection of her digital works. Two pieces related to the installation The Desert Is Watching observe and transform the landscape of the desert, while The Fourth Dimension explores the cultural landscapes of Japan. Part of the series Alternative Visions.

Exhibitions

Jeanne Dunning: Study after Untitled
January 25 – April 2

The Bancroft Library at 100: A Celebration, 1906–2006
February 11 – December 3

MATRIX 219: Wilhelm Sasnal
Through February 26

Dreaming California: Ruth-Marion Baruch, Bill Owens, and Larry Sultan
January 18 – May 21

Measure of Time
February 22 – June 2007

Figurations
Through January 15

Turning Corners
Through January 22

Film Series

Mikio Naruse
January 12 – February 18

A Theater Near You
January 13, 14, 20

Alternative Visions
January 17 – February 28

The Women's Film Preservation Fund
January 24 – February 21

Weird America
Wednesdays, January 18 – February 22

African Film Festival
January 27 – February 17

Human Rights Watch International Film Festival 2006
February 19 – 26

Film 50: History of Cinema
Wednesday Matinees, January 18 – May 3

Credit Line

The University of California, Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive is supported by the National Endowment for the Arts and the Institute of Museum and Library Services. Additional support is provided by the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the Koret Foundation, the Bernard Osher Foundation, Packard Humanities Institute, the Henry Luce Foundation, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the Columbia Foundation, the Christensen Fund, the William H. Donner Foundation, San Francisco Foundation, Gap Inc., other private foundations and corporations, and our individual donors and members. Major endowment support has been provided by the Phyllis C. Wattis Foundation and by George Gund III.

Gap Inc. is proud to support First Impressions: Free First Thursdays at BAM/PFA. For more information about Free First Thursday gallery tours and screenings visit our website at bampfa.berkeley.edu.

University of California, Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive
Located at 2626 Bancroft Way, just below College Avenue near the UC Berkeley campus.

Gallery and Museum Store Hours:
Wednesday and Friday to Sunday, 11 to 5; Thursday 11 to 7. Closed Monday and Tuesday.

Admission:
General admission is $8; admission for seniors, disabled persons, non-UC Berkeley students, and young adults (13 – 17) is $5; admission for BAM/PFA members, UC Berkeley students, staff and faculty, and children under 12 is free; admission for group tours is $3 per person (to arrange a group tour, call [510] 642-5188). Admission is free on the first Thursday of each month.

Information:
24-hour recorded message (510) 642-0808; FAX (510) 642-4889;
PFA recorded message (510) 642-1124; TDD: (510) 642-8734

Website: bampfa.berkeley.edu

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