JEM COHEN
Sat 21 Nov 6.00pm
Lighthouse
£5.00/£4.00 concessions
Tickets available from Lighthouse
Based in New York, Jem Cohen’s work straddles documentary, artists’ film and the essay or diary film and is at once lyrical and poetic, compassionate yet incisive. This double programme of his city films is accompanied by a Q&A between Jem and writer Gareth Evans.
Presented in association with AURORA.
INVISIBLE CITIES I
Italian city-portraits Programme 74 mins
BLOOD ORANGE SKY
DIRECTOR: Jem Cohen. USA 1999. 26mins
A portrait of Catania, Sicily; the ocean at 5 a.m., the fish market, the distributor of pornographic films, the woodworker, the elephant statue, housing projects, and a young girl in an orange sweater. Catania is a large and remarkable city without many tourists or tourist attractions. Its people live in the shadow of Mt. Etna, an active volcano. Original soundtrack music by Mark Linkous of the band Sparklehorse.
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AMBER CITY
DIRECTOR: Jem Cohen. USA 1999. 48mins
A portrait of an unnamed city in Italy. Using a voiceover narration that collages direct observation, literary texts, historical fact, local folklore, and a bit of sheer fabrication, it melds documentary and narrative, past and present. Visuals range from verité street footage, to formal portraits of residents, to an unusual type of time lapse cinematography that allows filming in the low-intensity light of night landscapes and museum interiors. Made in collaboration with local residents and institutions, AMBER CITY reflects on the “in-betweeness” of places whose historical and geographical location renders their reality strangely invisible.
STREETSONGS: NEW YORK NOTESBOOKS
Programme 72 mins
LONG FOR THE CITY
DIRECTOR: Jem Cohen. 2008 9mins
Patti Smith’s New York.
NYC WEIGHTS AND MEASURES
DIRECTOR: Jem Cohen. USA 2006. 6mins
“My film is a simple gathering of New York City street footage. It was shot with a spring-wound 16mm Bolex on, above, and below the streets of Manhattan and Brooklyn and includes footage of the ticker tape parade for astronaut John Glenn… Due to supposed “national security concerns,” recent prohibitions are restricting what can be filmed in New York and other locales. While shooting from a train window in 2005, my film was confiscated and turned over to the Joint Terrorism Task Force and the F.B.I. This piece, which once might have been seen as strictly “lyrical,” is now also a reflection on these issues.” —Jem Cohen
LITTLE FLAGS
DIRECTOR: Jem Cohen. USA 2000. 6mins
ONE BRIGHT DAY
DIRECTOR: Jem Cohen. USA 2009. 17mins
A drunkard swears at Madison Square Garden: war, abandonment, past splendour.
LOST BOOK FOUND
DIRECTOR: Jem Cohen. USA 1996. 37mins
Documentary street footage organised into a meditation on city life. Over five years worth of collected images are used to evoke a mysterious notebook filled with obsessive listings of places, objects and incidents. These listings serve as the key to a hidden city, a city of unconsidered geographies and layered artifacts – the relics of low level capitalism and the debris of countless forgotten narratives. Influenced by the work of Walter Benjamin as well as Cohen’s first job, selling Italian ices on Canal Street.
