Cosponsored by Istituto Italiano di Cultura, San Francisco, and La Méditerranée.
Artists in Person, February 26
"A militant sort of poetry is found throughout their documentary work."-Arte
Milan-based filmmakers Yervant Gianikian and Angela Ricci Lucchi have been making films for twenty–five years, primarily reexamining rare archival footage, which they painstakingly search out. After lengthy consideration of each film frame, they begin to work their particular magic. They rephotograph scenes, some of which may be decomposing or disintegrating, often reframing and slowing down the image; tint and hand color sections; and commission music. The results are meditations without dialogue-fragmentary, hypnotic, often melancholic, and as much about cinema as history. Much of the footage was originally shot as propaganda and represents ideological positions abhorrent to the filmmakers. But as Ricci Lucchi explains, "We use ready-mades. We transform the old into the new." They've been described as archeologists of cinema who show how events of the past speak of the present, how the early half of the twentieth century continues to shape events today. Themes related to war, imperialism, human tragedy, and the environment echo throughout their work, as does a deep interest in cinematic memory, or to use their words, in "an ethical sense of vision."
-Kathy Geritz
Recent retrospectives of their work include La Biennale D'Arte di Venezia and Cinemateca Portuguesa, Lisbon, 2001; Cinémathèque Française, Paris; Museum of Modern Art, New York; and Festival du Réel, Nyon, 2000.
Yervant Gianikian and Angela Ricci Lucchi will also appear at the San Francisco Cinematheque on Sunday, February 24 (San Francisco Art Institute) and Thursday, February 29 (Yerba Buena Center for the Arts). For information call (415) 822-2285. Members of the SF Cinematheque, Italian Cultural Institute, and BAM/PFA will receive member discounts at all screenings.