Jan 18, 2011
SFFILM
The San Francisco Film Society will present Fever Dreams: Laurel Nakadate, a multiplatform presentation of the work of American multimedia artist Laurel Nakadate, February 23-March 2. Fever Dreams kicks off KinoTek 2011-12, an eclectic series of programs dedicated to cross-platform and emergent media, supported by a two-year, $80,000 grant from the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts.
SFFS will present eight KinoTek programs over 2011 and 2012. Each program will feature the work of an artist or practice that challenges the boundaries of screen-based art and will be accompanied by an original article commissioned by SFFS.
Fever Dreams will include theatrical screenings of Nakadate’s two feature works, the presentation of a number of her shorter videos in nontheatrical venues and a collectible poster featuring her photography. Additionally, the February 24 edition of the Film Society’s online magazine, SF360.org, will feature an original article, commissioned by SFFS, by Mary Gaitskill on Nakadate’s work. Gaitskill, perhaps best known for her short story “Secretary,” has been a contributor to the New Yorker, Harper’s and Esquire. Gaitskill’s writing, like Nakadate’s work, often poetically explores the intersection of sex and power.
For complete program information, visit sffs.org/screenings-and-events/kinotek
“The Film Society continues to be inspired by the innovative and provocative projects the Warhol Foundation has supported over the past two decades,” said Executive Director Graham Leggat. “We are very pleased that with their support we will be able to greatly expand the scope of KinoTek, which aims to present the most innovative new work and explore its social contexts and effects. And very pleased, too, to kick off 2011’s programs with Laurel’s provocative work and an appreciation of it by Mary Gaitskill.”
Nakadate engages viewers in a manner that has drawn comparisons to Miranda July, Todd Solondz and Lars von Trier. She has made her mark by taking on the thorniness of female adolescence, exploring the arcane psyche of single men and testing the boundaries between exploitation and empathy, which led New York Times critic Ken Johnson to call her “smart and scarily adventurous.” Underlying her work is her belief that “it’s a really good thing to put yourself in a situation where you feel really uncomfortable because I think things can come out of that discomfort.”
“Laurel Nakadate’s forays into several media represent a true project in that she has conceived and set a course and is following all of the implications of her work,” said Film Society programmer Sean Uyehara, who curates the KinoTek programs. “I am especially awed by the combination of seeming improvisation with absolute control that can be seen throughout the decade-long undertaking. I am very pleased that we are able to present her in San Francisco thanks to the support of the Warhol Foundation grant.”
Nakadate is a photographer, video artist and filmmaker. She was born in Austin, Texas and raised in Ames, Iowa. She received a BFA from Tufts University and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and an MFA in photography from Yale University. Her work has been exhibited at museums and galleries worldwide including MoMA PS1, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, the Getty Museum and the Museo Reina Sofia. In 2009, her first feature film, Stay the Same Never Change, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and went on to be featured in New Directors/New Films at MoMA and Lincoln Center. Her second feature, The Wolf Knife, premiered at the 2010 Los Angeles Film Festival and was nominated for a 2010 Gotham Independent Film Award and a 2011 Independent Spirit Award. Nakadate’s work is in many public and private collections including the Yale University Art Gallery, the Saatchi Collection and the Museum of Modern Art. She is represented by Leslie Tonkonow Artworks + Projects, New York and lives in New York City.
On Wednesday, February 23 an insert of Nakadate’s photographs will be included in the San Francisco Bay Guardian. The photos come from the Lucky Tiger series and, like much of her other work, feature a troubling mix of girlish femininity and voyeuristic menace. These small snapshots in which Nakadate appears in suggestive poses were inspired by 1950s style cheesecake and camera club photos. The works were completed during a performance in which the artist and anonymous middle-aged men whom she enlisted via Craig’s List, covered their hands with fingerprinting ink and touched the photographs while discussing and passing them around.
At 7:30 pm that evening Nakadate will present a free talk at the California College of Arts Timkin Lecture Hall, offering insight into her working concepts and methods. The talk will be followed by a Q&A with the artist.
On Thursday, February 24 Nakadate’s two feature-length videos, The Wolf Knife(2010) and Stay the Same Never Change (2009) will screen at the Roxie Theater at 7:00 pm and 9:40 pm respectively. Featuring vibrant photography and intense performances, the videos are a revelation in composition and elliptical narrative. Like her photography, Nakadate’s feature-length videos present the wondrous and uneasy collision of feminine adolescent fantasy and masculine angst and repression. These multidimensional works reveal a shifting terrain of power among their various protagonists. Single film tickets $11 year-round SFFS members, $13 general, $12 seniors, students and persons with disabilities; double feature $15 year-round SFFS members, $18 general. Box office opens February 1 for members and February 8 for the general public: online at sffs.org or call 415-561-5000 for information.
Additionally, throughout the week (February 23-March 2) a selection of Nakadate’s short-form videos (2006-10) will be on display, free of charge, in the Mission District at the Roxie Theater, Artists’ Television Access, the Summit and the Explorist International.
In spring 2010 the Warhol Foundation selected the Film Society to receive an $80,000 grant to support KinoTek programs in 2011 and 2012. The Warhol grants are tailored to support scholarly exhibitions, publications and visual arts programming and to foster innovative artistic expression and the creative process by encouraging and supporting cultural organizations that in turn, directly or indirectly, support artists and their work.
Previous KinoTek programs include Utopia in Four Movements, a live documentary by Sam Green and Dave Cerf; Catherine Galasso: Lightning Never Strikes the Same Place Twice, a live dance piece; Pocket Cinema, a program of mobile media; and 13 Most Beautiful…Songs for Andy Warhol’s Screen Tests, Warhol’s classic silent film portraits of pop icons presented with newly commissioned soundtracks performed live by dream-pop duo Dean and Britta.
Upcoming KinoTek programs
June: Marius Watz, generative/parametric art and 3D printing
August: Erin Markey, experimental theater and live cinema
November: Karolina Sobecka, animation and interaction design
For screeners and interviews contact hilary@sffs.org.
For photos and press materials visit sffs.org/pressdownloads.
Laurel Nakadate: Only the Lonely, a ten-year survey of photographs, video, sculpture and films, is on view at MoMA PS1 through August 8. For more information visit ps1.org/exhibitions