Henry Hills: Rhythmic States

BALI MECANIQUE

Henry Hills in person!

Filmforum welcomes back Henry Hills on his first screenings in Los Angeles since the late 1990s.  

“Hills breaks down standard sounds and images, transforming them into perceptive alternatives, political critiques, and a search for occult, creative expressions that have not been said or explored before.” —Mónica Savirón

"Henry Hills...has been a distinguished film artist for several decades. He is intimately connected and acknowledged by many of the most influential poets in the United States as one of the filmmakers most closely connected to the poetics of the L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E movement.” – -- P.Adams Sitney

“Accepting the speed of contemporary life and an exponentially increasing mass of information moving at a constantly accelerating velocity as given, Henry Hills composes films which present models of concentration, condensing masses of imagery to their essential moments and radically juxtaposing these to create pathways for thought. Rapid editing as generally employed in the mass media presents a mindless profusion of trivialities whose function is to lull the viewer into a semihypnotic state of receptivity. By contrast, Hills' work demands (and creates the conditions for) intensely directed attention. Rhythmically complex and varied, his films probe the depths of the topics at hand and in doing so expose new ways of seeing, educating the eye for a more critical viewing of the immense flow of images with which we are daily assaulted and suggesting fresh approaches to looking at the world at large. Closely allied to new developments in music, dance, and poetry, Hills' work remains fresh over the years. Films he made over a decade ago seem new today. Their ready accessibility belies their extreme density, which encourages and rewards multiple viewings.”

HENRY HILLS has been making dense, intensely rhythmic experimental films since 1975. A longtime resident of New York's East Village, he has ongoing working relationships with the

L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E Poets, composer John Zorn, and choreographer Sally Silvers. Since 2005 he has been Visiting Professor at FAMU, the Czech national film academy in Prague, and currently lives in Vienna. He received a 2009 John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship & his films, which are included in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art, are available on DVD from Tzadik (www.tzadik.com). His most recent work, "arcana", was awarded Best Experimental Film at both Curtas Vila do Conde festival in Portugal and the Melbourne International Film Festival in Australia.  http://www.henryhills.com/

In collaboration with REDCAT.  Henry Hills will be presenting a different program at REDCAT on Monday April 28, 8:30pm.  For more information see http://www.redcat.org/event/henry-hills

For more event information: www.lafilmforum.org, or 323-377-7238

 Tickets: $10 general, $6 students/seniors; free for Filmforum members.