Stan Brakhage’s DOG STAR MAN (new 16mm print!)

Stan Brakhage’s DOG STAR MAN (new 16mm print!)

With Jane Brakhage, by Barbara Hammer

Sunday May 1, 2022, doors 7 pm, screening at 7:30 pm

In person at 2220 Arts + Archives, 2220 W. Beverly Blvd., Los Angeles CA 90057

Plentiful parking on Beverly and in the church lot across the street

Proof of vaccination and mask required, ages 21+

Tickets: $12 general, $8 students/seniors, free for Filmforum members

At https://link.dice.fm/K554483275a9

Regarded for decades as one of the monumental and iconic works of the historical American avant-garde, Stan Brakhage’s five-part Dog Star Man remains a defining and radically original work of independent cinema.  Utilizing numerous inventive filmmaking techniques ranging from distortion lenses, multiple superimpositions, hyperkinetic editing, hand-painting, and even the physical collaging of materials onto the film strip, Dog Star Man employs a vividly subjective, hypnagogic vision following a mythic man’s ascent and struggle through the obstacles and vicissitudes of existence.  Images of birth, death, nature, the cosmos, and the psyche gradually combine and coalesce over the course of the film’s 74 minutes with increasing intensity and complexity, resulting in a total cinematic experience that remains unique nearly sixty years after its initial making.

In acknowledgement of Jane Brakhage’s role in Stan’s life and art at that time, and in pursuit of an enriching contrast with the larger-than-life shadow that Stan Brakhage casts, Dog Star Man will be preceded by Barbara Hammer’s probing and intimate portrait film from 1974, Jane Brakhage.  In Hammer’s film, she frames Jane – through her actions and words – as another sort of mythic figure, considered as wholly independent from her celebrated husband, and in deep dialogue with her own identity as wife, mother, philosopher, and human animal. (Mark Toscano)