DOCUMENTARY | USA / GERMANY | 2017 | 73 MIN.
by Lynn Hershman Leeson
Lynn Hershman Leeson. Born in Cleveland, USA in 1941, the renowned artist and filmmaker was one of the first to utilise interactive media in her art. Her work, which includes over 50 films and videos, has featured in 200 international exhibitions and collections including MoMa New York and San Francisco, London’s Tate Modern and the Lehmbruck Museum in Duisburg. Alongside identity and feminism, she is currently focusing on technical innovations in mass communication, artificial intelligence and biotechnology. Her feature films CONCEIVING ADA and TEKNOLUST (both with Tilda Swinton) screened in the Berlinale Forum.
* * *
Dr Frank Ochberg is a New York-based psychiatrist and trauma specialist. His specialism is post-traumatic stress disorder and the Stockholm Syndrome. Cuban artist Tania Bruguera consults him after spending eight months in a Cuban prison. A dissident, she was accused of treason for a performance she was developing that was critical of the government. During her conversations with her therapist she analyses the revolutionary potential of art and how the censor intervened even before she was able to perform the piece in question. The short-term, spontaneous and transitory nature of performance art represents a means to criticise the Cuban government. Just six months after her release an undaunted Bruguera was already inviting artists from all over the world to Cuba. Lynn Hershman Leeson’s previous documentaries Strange Culture and !Women Art Revolution – A Secret History, both of which screened in the Panorama, closely scrutinised the concept of political and critical art forms. In her new work, she has chosen to collaborate once more with Tilda Swinton who narrates Bruguera’s ‘Manifesto on Artists’ Rights’.
* * *
With Tania Bruguera, Frank Ochberg, Tilda Swinton (Narrator)
Director Lynn Hershman Leeson
Cinematography Hiro Narita, Shane King
Editing Lynn Hershman Leeson, Shane King
Music Ibeyi
Sound Dan Olmsted
Production Management Celia Kitchell
Produced by HOTWIRE PRODUCTIONS (USA)
International sales George Rush
Producer Lynn Hershman Leeson
Co-producers Celia Kitchell, Alexandra Phelps, Michael Henrichs
DOCUMENTARY | USA / GERMANY | 2017 | 73 MIN.
by Lynn Hershman Leeson
selected festivals