ON VIEW
Terence Gower: Ciudad Moderna
January 21 – April 19, 2020
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"Must-see...a valentine to Mexico City's modernist architecture” – Artforum
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Working in video, sculpture, drawing, and photography, New York-based artist Terence Gower (b. British Colombia, 1965) investigates the material and intellectual histories of postwar positivism in art and architecture. The contemporary built environments of 1960s Mexico are the focus of his 2004 video, Ciudad Moderna. A kinetic, six-minute montage of clips drawn from the 1966 Mexican comedy film “Despedida de Casada,” Ciudad Moderna wittily transforms its source material to examine the film’s modernist architectural backdrop. Using freeze frames, projection drawings and clever digital composites, Gower analyzes some of the most celebrated modernist monuments of Latin American history, from Mexico City’s famed Museum of Anthropology to the Hotel Presidente in Acapulco.
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CINEMA
Three Films by Farrokhzad and Golestan
Wednesday, February 12, 7 PM, FREE
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These three films demonstrate the rich aesthetic possibilities of the sponsored film. The House is Black (1961), directed by Forugh Farrokhzad, is considered a masterpiece of Iranian cinema. The film, screening in a recent Cineteca di Bologna restoration, focuses on a leper colony, and Farrokhzad, a modernist poet, brings a lyrical and humanist but unsentimental grace to the subject. Wave, Coral, and Rock (1958-1961) is a poetic reflection on the processes of labor and industrialization under Iran’s new oil regime. Finally, Golestan’s The Hills of Marlik (1963), also newly restored, focuses on an archeological excavation, considering the land’s use in the past, present, and future. In Farsi with English subtitles.
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New restorations of Farrokhzad's The House is Black and Golestan’s The Hills of Marlik thanks to Cineteca di Bologna. Print of Wave, Coral, and Rock courtesy of the Film Studies Center at the University of Chicago. Part of the Block Cinema Series Selections from the Golestan Film Workshop.
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CINEMA & PERFORMANCE
Electro-Pythagoras (a portrait of Martin Bartlett) (2017) with sound designer Ernst Karel
Thursday, February 13, 7 PM, FREE
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British film artist Luke Fowler lends his unmatched gift for portraiture to this sensitive, curious exploration of electronic music composer Martin Bartlett. Electro-Pythagoras turns the conventions of biographical documentary on their head, weaving personal photographs, letters, notes, rare performances, and new 16mm footage into a dense, evocative fugue. Sound artist Ernst Karel’s soundtrack is every bit as adventurous, a fitting tribute to the film’s defiantly queer, uncompromising subject. Following the screening, Ernst Karel will perform a quadrophonic sound composition, drawing on recordings from Bartlett’s archives.
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Co-presented by Block Cinema with the MFA in Documentary Media at Northwestern, the MA in Sound Arts and Industries, the Department of Performance Studies, and CHIRP Radio 107.1 FM. Part of the Block Cinema series Sonic Signature: Approaches to Film Sound.
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CINEMA
Pyaasa (Thirst) (1957)
Friday, February 14, 7 PM, FREE
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Guru Dutt’s melancholy romantic drama is an icon of Hindi cinema’s golden age. Dutt, who counts among India’s greatest directors, also stars in the film as Vijay, a poor poet searching for recognition and respect. Set in Calcutta, the film considers the position of the creative underclass amidst postcolonial India’s uncompromising development agendas. The enigmatic Waheeda Rehman plays Gulabo, a sex worker who finds solace in Vijay’s poetry. Pyaasa also features some of Bollywood’s most enduring love songs, composed by S.D. Burman and Sahir Ludhianvi. In Hindi with English subtitles.
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In a new restoration from Ultra Media. Presented by Block Cinema with support from the Consulate General of India, Chicago, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Part of Block Cinema series Morning Will Come: Modernity in Indian Cinema.
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PARTNER CONVERSATION
The Aftermath of the Assassination of Qassem Soleimani
Friday, February 14, 2 PM, FREE
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The assassination of Qassem Soleimani and the subsequent shooting down of Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 shook the world. But how do people in Iran make sense of these events and their political ramifications in the Middle East? What do these events mean to Iranian diaspora here in the US? And how are these events shaping the ways that Americans think about Iran and the Middle East? Join a panel of Northwestern faculty, students and staff at the Block Museum to explore these questions and to discuss the social context to recent geopolitical events. Panelists include Foorogh Farhang, PhD candidate in Anthropology and Shirin Vossoughi, Assistant Professor of Learning Sciences in conversation with Danny Postel, Assistant Director of the Center for International and Area Studies (moderator).
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Presented by Buffett Institute for Global Affairs in partnership with The Block Museum of Art, Northwestern's Middle East and North African Studies and Weinberg College Center for International and Area Studies.
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