Cinematic Graphite
Co-presented with the Menil Collection
Friday, March 23, 8PM
Location: Menil Collection Lawn, 1515 Sul Ross
Free Admission
In collaboration with the Menil Collection exhibit, “Richard Serra Drawing: A Retrospective” and its curator Michelle White, Aurora Picture Show presents an outdoor screening on the Menil lawn of films that explore the gesture of the line and mark making. Audience members are invited to bring their picnics, blankets and lawn chairs. Good Dog Hot Dog food truck will also be on location.
This screening is inspired by the exhibition on display at the Menil Collection from March 2 to June 10, “Richard Serra Drawing: A Retrospective”, the first retrospective of the artist’s drawings. Serra is among a significant group of artists whose transformative work irrevocably changed the practice and definition of modernist drawing, and challenged drawing’s role in the traditional hierarchy of media. With short videos and films from renowned artists such as Paul McCarthy to emerging artists such as UH student Thais Verissimo, Aurora Curator Mary Magsamen has selected a program of works that showcase how artists have created marks, gestures and lines through performance, animation, painting, computer graphics and traditional graphite on paper.
Short films included in the program:
12 Sketches by Magali Charrier - 12 Sketches uses animation and editing in a unique exploration of the liminal zones between you and me, here and there, sound and silence, movement and stillness.
Tra La La by Magali Charrier - Tra La La is a poetic reflection on the ephemeral nature of innocence and childhood. The film takes us on a rollercoaster ride through the politics of childhood and sibling rivalry. This fantasy black and white film uses stop frame animation and live performance.
Four Parallel Lines by Mary Ellen Strom and Ann Carlson - Four Parallel Lines is a video made in collaboration with four men who work as day laborers, Jose Bautista, Joel Gomez, Lisandrow Vicente and Carlos Hernandez. Four parallel lines are drawn on a stretch of beach using 6 x 2 inch lumber. This scene references Walter De Marias’s, 1968 earthwork in which he drew two parallel mile long lines in the Mojave Desert.
Body Tracks by Ana Mendieta - "The turning point in art was in 1972, when I realized that my paintings were not real enough for what I want the image to convey and by real I mean I wanted my images to have power, to be magic."
Painting Face Down by Paul McCarthy - McCarthy uses his own body as a tool to examine the process of making art: He becomes a human paintbrush as he drags himself across the floor while holding an open can of white paint.
Sets by Cheryl Donegan - Playing on stereotypes of the artist's studio activities and the process of making art, the artist creates marks on paper and on her partner’s body.
Brooklyn Bridge by Joan Jonas - Still photographs, live video, and superimposed drawings created on a Quantel Paintbox are fused in this visual poem dedicated to a New York City landmark, the Brooklyn Bridge.
Meer by Robert Todd - Marks made in a sea of refracting reflections.
Keep It Together by Thais Verissimo - In Keep It Together, a line of red slowly diminishes while a hand futilely and continuously attempts to keep it whole.
Matchstick by Jeff Scher - Matchstick was painted in watercolors and water-soluble crayons on 3-foot long, three inches thin strips of paper. The style grew out of paintings I make for a pre-cinema Praxinoscope*, which grew from experiments with painting on film. Matchstick was mostly painted frame at a time under a digital camera mounted on a traditional animation stand with a mechanical stage, which was used to keep the paper moving. The idea was to paint and draw abstract visuals that could dance along to the psychedelic song by the band American Royalty.
Train of Thought by Leo Bridle - In a world made entirely out of paper, the wistful drawings in a man’s sketchbook are brought to life by the rhythm of a train journey.
1:1 by Richard Reeves - Exploring the one to one relationship between sound and picture. Both image and sounds are etched directly onto 35mm film. The first part of the visuals are actually the sounds you hear.
About Richard Serra Drawing: A Retrospective
Richard Serra Drawing: A Retrospective (on view at the Menil Collection from March 2 – June 10, 2012) is the first retrospective of the artist’s drawings, as well as the first major one-person exhibition organized under the umbrella of the Menil Drawing Institute and Study Center. While Serra’s sculptures have been widely recognized and the subject of numerous museum exhibitions, his drawings, which have played a crucial role in his work for over forty years, have not received a critical overview. This exhibition, with work from major European and American public and private collections, traces Serra’s investigation of drawing as an activity both independent from and linked to his sculptural practice. Organized chronologically, it addresses significant shifts in concept, materials, and scale, and culminates with new large-scale works completed for this presentation.