NZ Film Festival: The Artists Cinema

The second annual Artists Cinema programme again asks for a ‘response, comment interruption and/ or reflection on the cinema context’. Curated by Mark Williams, Alex Monteith and Jan Bryant, this year’s programme includes themes as diverse as today’s global political malaise, ‘bogan’ culture and what Wolfgang Iser refers to the function of art: ‘the subversion of the illusions on which our perception is based’. While these artists are fluent with mixed media installation, multiscreen imagery and site-specific response, each work on The Artists Cinema is presented in a form suited to traditional cinema presentation. This project aims to bring some of the criticality of the artist’s practice in the white cube into the realm of the black box. Likewise, the programme itself aims to be propositional in nature, leaving space for the audience to consider how these works address the political, aesthetic and structural aspects of the cinematic form.

Image credit: Burn Out by Steve Carr.