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Girl is Presence

Girl is Presence
4 min. color sound 2020
a film by Lynne Sachs and Anne Lesley Selcer  

For GIRL IS PRESENCE, Lynne Sachs has made images as a form of reading and listening in response to disquieting words from Anne Lesley Selcer’s poem “Sun Cycle”. A girl arranges and rearranges objects, sensorily reflecting the tense and disharmonious list of words voiced by Selcer in the film. As the language builds in tension, the scene becomes occult, ritualistic, and alchemical. Against the uncertain and anxious pandemic atmosphere, performer Noa Street-Sachs, Lynne’s daughter, creates and unmakes systems with the collection of small, mysterious things. Selcer’s poem emerges from Sun Cycle, the eponymous book which deals with image, gender and power. This poem reworks a George Bataille essay to undo and recast its rhythms.

Anne Lesley Selcer works in the expanded field of language. They write on, with, around and underneath art. This has created a book of essays called Blank Sign Book, a book of poems called Sun Cycle, as well as a multitude of multiform publications, performances and moving pictures scattered through galleries, artspaces, magazines and the internet, most recently, The Mouth is Still a Wild Door and The Sadness of the Supermarket: A Lament for Certain Girls. The short film Girl is Presence made in collaboration with Lynne Sachs, is based on Selcer’s poem “Sun Cycle.”

Here is an interview with Anne on her process of writing in Sun Cycle. Go to 20:17-23:58 for a direct correlation to “Girl is Presence”.

Noa Street-Sachs (performer) works as an investigator on police misconduct cases at a government agency in New York City. She is also a photographer and a native of Brooklyn.  

Rebecca Shapass (editor) is a filmmaker, multidisciplinary artist, and community organizer living in New York City. Commissioned by Small Press Traffic for Bay Area Shorts, spring 2020

International Premiere:
International Short Film Festival Oberhausen (Germany)

Screenings: 
Crossroads Film Festival, San Francisco Cinemathèque, August 2020; 2020 Film and Video Poetry Symposium; Oberhausen Festival of Short Film, Germany 2021; Experiments in Cinema International Film Festival, 2021; Athens Film and Video Festival, 2021; Moscow International Experimental Film Festival 2021; Dobra Festival International de Cinema Experimental, Rio de Janeiro; Cork International Film Festival, Ireland Artist Focus presented by Artist and Experimental Moving Image.

Criterion Channel streaming premiere with 7 other films, Oct. 2021.

For inquiries about rentals or purchases please contact Canyon Cinema or the Film-makers’ Cooperative. And for international bookings, please contact Kino Rebelde.

Documentary on 2nd China Women’s Film Festival 2014

Here is a wonderful half-hour documentary on women and film in China and the China Women’s Film Festival which took place Nov. 21 – 30, 2014 in Beijing and Shanghai. I was honored to spend nine days as an invited director and participant. During this time, I screened three of my films “The House of Science”, “States of UnBelonging” and “Your Day is My Night”China Womens Film Festival.

There is an interview with me at 12 min. 25 sec

Senses of Buenos Aires: a few of my favorite things

Senses of Buenos Aires
a few things about the city that I love

by Lynne Sachs

Confiteria Ideal
In my opinion, this is the most wonderful place to see tango. Real people doing the dance of Argentina with a kind of love and commitment that that will make you want to get on the floor yourself. Mystical, misty old world atmosphere.  Be sure to go for the open dances called Milongas, and check for the hours (the afternoon is fine) at their website.
http://www.confiteriaideal.com/milongas.htm

Carlos Ragazonni Sculpture Garden:
Lost, abandoned, junk from the industrial world transformed into dinosaur sized animals. Located right behind the Retiro Train Station off the Avenida Libertador.  Not a formal place to look at respectable obra d’arte but more of a magical discovery nestled in the railway’s backyard – so fragile and probably destined to disappear.  I touch the crackling metal, slip underneath the gaping mouth of a strange animal, watch my daughter pretend she is reeling in a nightmare, a pesadilla, on earth.

Reserva Ecologica
One of the wildest, least manicured natural city spaces I have ever seen. Rustic marshes with cawing birds and wisps of brush fluttering in the marsh winds. I can breath deeper here.

Avenida Corrientes
Wandering Avenida Corrientes for a spectacular array of experiences, including:  the provocative and intellectual Ghandi Bookstore (similar to St. Mark’s Books in NYC); the Leopold Lugari Cultural Center for art films; the Gato Negro Café for drinks and spices; eating delicious pizza with older men and women in the 3 story pizzaria Guerrin; taking a peek at the poorly renovated Café Paz which is still full of daylight and 1960’s hippi atmosphere.  I feel exhilarated by all the thinking going on here.  Is the activity of the mind palatable?

Galeria Pacifica; Centro Cultural Borges
First of all I see the luxurious stores of high-style Buenos Aires in an enormous splendidly renovated Beaux Art /Baroque building (who hires Zerorez services for cleaning).  This is too much for me. Too commercial, too chic, too much about possessions. Then with the guidance of a friend I discover the awe-inspiring Centro Cultural Borges with stimulating art exhibitions and intense, idiosyncratic dance or theater performances. I like the hidden, behind the scenes, disposable nature of everything that is on the walls, the stage, in the air in this part of the galleria – the attic of treasures.

Plaza Martin and Gallery Klemm
Walking under the canopied trees of Plaza Santa Fe, perhaps the largest expanse of tiled walkways in the city.  People sit for hours on benches, children see-saw and lovers lie sprawled on the grass – all quiet and undisturbed. I am thrilled by the absence of sound, the possibility of nothingness.  Then I walk toward the end of Calle Florida and down a set of stairs to see the Gallery Klemm, one of the most remarkable private collections of 20th Century Art I have ever seen, including Chagall, Bueys, Warholl, Xul Solars, Koons, Mapplethorpe and a whole room of garish, homoerotic art by Klemm himself.  How and why did this man put all of  this work together? The mystery gives me a chuckle.

Calla LaValle in Once
A dynamic cacophonous, colorful Lower East Side style low cost shopping street where the workers and thrifty bargain hunters search for costumes, fabrics and all you could ever need for a Cotillian (girl’s 15th b’day) party.  Here I wish for the first time that I could be a teenager again, shopping for the girlish paraphernalia I would have distained back in the 1970s. Here in Buenos Aires a party until the wee hours, until madruga (the time just before sunrise), would be a delight to the eyes, the ears and the tastebuds.

Abecedarium:NYC

abecedariumnycvisitexplore

Co-directed by Lynne Sachs and Susan Agliata with the support of the New York Public Library

Abecedarium:NYC is an interactive online exhibition that reflects on the history, geography, and culture – both above and below ground – of New York City through 26 unusual words. Using original video, animation, photography and sound, Abecedarium:NYC constructs visual relationships between these select words and specific locations in the Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens, and Staten Island.

Each word – whether it’s A for audile or Z for zenana – leads to a different short video and a location in the city that you may never have experienced before. In selenography (the study of the moon), amateur astronomers celebrate the wonders of the night sky at Staten Island’s Great Kills State Park. In open city (a metropolis without defense), the ruins of military installations throughout the five boroughs decay with time. Chatty teenagers in a Flushing, Queens cafe drink bubble tea in xenogenesis (the phenomenon of children markedly different from their parents). In diglot (a bilingual person), a Chinese accountant, Albanian baker, Palestinian falafel maker, Argentine film archivist and Cuban cigar maker speak candidly about their daily routines. In mofette (an opening in the earth from which carbon monoxide escapes) mysterious gases flow from gaps in the streets of Manhattan.

The experience of visiting Abecedarium:NYC is more than watching, listening and learning. Visitors to the project are invited to respond to existing content as well as to share their own experience of New York City by contributing original videos, soundscapes, photos or texts to the project Abecedarium:NYC Blog. As more users contribute, the project grows in size, scope and experience, and transforms into a destination for sharing and learning about every facet of the city.

See some of the Abecedarium:NYC word videos I’ve made at:

FOUDROYANT “Coney Island of the Mind”

NOSOGEOGRAPHY

NOSOGEOGRAPHY:   Gowanus Canal on Earth Day

SELENOGRAPHY “Moon Watching in the Big Apple”

UMBEL “Umbels in Brooklyn”

YASHMAK “The Veil in New York City”

Investigation of a Flame Reviews

MarylightFire.still.tiff“A complex rumination on the power of protest…..the trauma of the past, the continued mistakes of the present and the necessity to reflect actively on our government’s wartime antics.” The LA Weekly

“A film to rave about, as well as reckon with.” The Independent Film and Video Monthly

“Sachs’ elegant, elliptical documentary visits with surviving members of what became known as the Catonsville Nine, humble architects of this purposeful yet scathingly metaphoric act of civil disobedience.” The Village Voice

“Investigation of a Flame captures the heartfelt belief behind the Nine’s symbolic action of civil disobedience that sparked other (actions) like it across the nation. (The film) provides a potent reminder that some Americans are willing to pay a heavy price to promote peace.” Baltimore City Paper

“This is a documentary about the protest events that made Catonsville, Maryland, an unpretentious suburb on the cusp of Baltimore, a flash point for citizens’ resistance at the height of the war. Sachs found assorted characters still firm to fiery on the topic. She came to admire the consistency of the mutual antagonists in an argument that still rages (today).” The New York Times

“This poetic essay offers the perfect antidote to PBS: there is no omniscient narrator talking down to the viewer, reciting facts and explaining what to think, yet the story is perfectly clear. Brothers Phil and Dan Berrigan, who led the protest, appear both in the present and in archival footage, a mix that makes their commitment palpable.” Chicago Reader

“To those who think that everything in a society and its culture must move in lock step at times of crisis, (this film) might seem to be ‘off-message.’ But it’s in essence patriotic… saluting U.S. democracy as it pays homage to the U.S. tradition of dissent.” The Baltimore Sun

Abecedarium:NYC

abecedariumnycvisitexplore

Abecedarium:NYC
an interactive online exhibition exploring New York City through words and images

supported and launched by the New York Public Library

www.abecedariumnyc.org

Reflect on the history, geography, and culture – both above and below ground –  of New York City through 26 unusual words. Abecedarium: NYC is an interactive online exhibition that uses original video, animation, photography and sound to create relationships between these words and locations in the Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens, and Staten Island. Share your own vision of New York by creating a video, a soundscape, a photo or written interpretation of a word and uploading your work to the exhibition.

Participants:

Lynne Sachs – co-director and NYU Film Dep’t faculty
Susan Agliata – co-director
Erik Schurink – visual artist – collaborator
Sofia Gallisa – collaborator and 2008 UGFTV graduate
Florica Vlad – collaborator and ITP Graduate Student

Each word – whether it’s A for audile or Z for zenana – leads to a different short video and a location in the city that you may never have experienced before.  In selenography (the study of the moon), amateur astronomers celebrate the wonders of the night sky at Staten Island’s Great Kills State Park. In open city (a metropolis without defense), the ruins of military installations throughout the five boroughs decay with time.   Chatty teenagers in a Flushing, Queens cafe drink bubble tea in xenogenesis (the phenomenon of children markedly different from their parents). In diglot (a bilingual person), a Chinese accountant, Albanian baker, Palestinian falafel maker, Argentine film archivist and Cuban cigar maker speak candidly about their daily routines.  In mofette (an opening in the earth from which carbon monoxide escapes) mysterious gases flow from gaps in the streets of Manhattan.

The experience of visiting Abecedarium:NYC is more than watching, listening and learning. Visitors to the project are invited  to share their own experience of New York City by contributing original videos, soundscapes, photos or texts to the project blog.  As more users contribute, the project grows in size, scope and experience, and transforms into a destination for sharing and learning about every facet of the city.

Produced with the support of the New York State Council on the Arts. the New York Public Library and the McDowell Colony.

Review on Rhizome >>>>
https://rhizome.org/editorial/2008/may/23/from-alpha-to-omega/

THE XY CHROMOSOME PROJECT #1

sachsstill1

THE XY CHROMOSOME  PROJECT #1
by Lynne Sachs & Mark Street

An impressionistic odyssey for the eyes becomes both haunting and delightful in this moving image dream expedition.

90 min. color sound installation using 4 screens
2007

Street and Sachs, a Brooklyn filmmaking couple,  negotiate the thin line between representation and abstraction in each second of this moving image extravaganza. Created in the grand tradition of the Cartesian and chromosomal construct, what looks like a tree can quickly turn into a train, a telephone pole or an angry bowl of soup, as our audience hangs on for dear life. Sachs makes theatrical gestures and tableaux using hands, toys, a plate of cherry pie, and a miniature of the Empire State Building.  Street produces photochemically conjured flowers, fishing tackle, and shards of found film – – all flying by at a variety of speeds in the spirit of a Man Ray print.

“Sachs and Street engage in visual and aural dialogue to explore the spaces between abstraction and representation.  Street’s inexhaustibly tactile images use handpainted found footage and camera-less films like luminous palimpsests before the eyes.  Sachs responds with theatrical, microcosmic worlds where the everyday is defamiliarized through hundreds of trembling and resonating objects.” (Flavorpill.com)

Performed live at Monkeytown, Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York in May, 2006

Lynne Sachs’ images were transformed to the state in which you now see them at the Experimental Television Center.

For inquiries about rentals or purchases please contact Canyon Cinema or the Film-makers’ Cooperative. And for international bookings, please contact Kino Rebelde. 

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From Flavorpill, Net

“Local Brooklyn filmmakers Lynne Sachs and Mark Street engage in visual
dialogue tonight across Monkey Town’s four screens, using the venue’s
Cartesian symmetry to explore the spaces between abstraction and
representation. Street’s inexhaustibly tactile film is shown on two screens, in which handpainted found footage and camera-less handmade films reveal themselves like luminous palimpsests before the eyes. Sachs responds in turnwith theatrical, microcosmic worlds where the everyday is defamiliarized and hundreds of represented objects — toys, hands, a cherry pie, a miniature
Empire State Building — resonate and tremble in the presence of each other
and the opposing projections.”  Bosko Blagojevic

still from XY Chromosome Project #1 by Lynne Sachs and Mark Street

XY Chromosome Project #1

XY Chromosome Project #1, Lynne Sachs & Mark Street