Vivian Ostrovsky: Plunge
EAI is pleased to present a special evening with filmmaker Vivian Ostrovsky to mark the New York launch of a compendium of her newly-remastered works by Paris-based experimental film hub Re:Voir. Ostrovsky, whose work ranges from montage shorts and diary features to experimental artists' bios and immersive installations, will introduce selections within and beyond the Re:Voir collection. A sneak peek of footage from her upcoming short, UNSOUND, which will be included in Film Forum's artists' commissions series, as well as short meditations on Chantal Akerman and Clarice Lispector, will be followed by a Q&A and reception.
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Thursday, April 11th, 2019 6:30 pm Electronic Arts Intermix (EAI) 535 West 22nd Street, 5th Fl. New York, NY 10011 www.eai.org Free admission RSVP |
Re:Voir publishes and distributes DVDs of classic and contemporary experimental cinema. Vivian Ostrovsky: Plunge is the label’s most recent compendium, a two-disc retrospective of Ostrovsky’s work featuring sixteen films between 1982 and 2014, and a sixty-page monograph with contributions by Amy Taubin, Federico Rossin, and Ostrovsky.
Born in New York, raised in Rio de Janeiro, and educated in Paris, Vivian Ostrovsky is a filmmaker whose art is as multifaceted as her biography. Working primarily in Super-8, Ostrovsky creates evocative hybrids of experimental genres such as the found footage collage, the essay film and the personal diary from an eclectic range of source materials. Music—pop, classical, archival—plays an important role, as does Ostrovsky’s improvisational editing techniques. In his essay for the Re:Voir anthology, Federico Rossin writes, “Multicultural, multilingual and anti-identitarian by nature, Vivian Ostrovsky insists on mixing genres and is dedicated to the art of combination. Her modus operandi consists of the hybridization, or combination, of poetic, humorous, ethnographic, autobiographical and cinematic visual and sonic ingredients…” Throughout her extensive body of work, Ostrovsky applies a keen observational eye and a sly sense of humor to merge the personal and the political, creating a filmic language that is distinctly her own.
Writes Rossin: “Combining great humility with breathtakingly precise audiovisual montage, Ostrovsky creates a field of artistic expression that escapes and expands beyond its boundaries (she has recently begun working in digital video); her hybrid cinema refuses to be limited by format or convention; with each new film, she liberates powerful new forms and expands her burgeoning creative practice.”
Vivian Ostrovsky, who studied cinema at the Sorbonne as a student of Henri Langlois and Éric Rohmer, is best known for her thirty-some film titles, which range from short exuberant montages to diary and portrait meditations to projected installations.
Before she became a filmmaker in the early 1980s, Ostrovsky was well known in cinema circles for her crucial role in promoting women's cinema and as a champion of experimental and avant-garde film. She remains an activist on behalf of the work of others, as a supporter and curator. Recently, she has spearheaded a preservation initiative to restore early Brazilian art film and video.
About EAI
Electronic Arts Intermix (EAI) is a nonprofit arts organization that fosters the creation, exhibition, distribution, and preservation of moving image art. A New York-based international resource for media art and artists, EAI holds a major collection of over 3,500 new and historical media artworks, from groundbreaking early video by pioneering figures of the 1960s to new digital projects by today’s emerging artists. EAI works closely with artists, museums, schools and other venues worldwide to preserve and provide access to this significant archive. EAI services also include viewing access, educational initiatives, extensive online resources, technical facilities, and public programs such as artists’ talks, screenings, and multi-media performances. EAI’s Online Catalogue is a comprehensive resource on the artists and works in the EAI collection, and features expansive materials on media art’s histories and current practices:
www.eai.org
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Electronic Arts Intermix
535 West 22nd Street, 5th Floor
New York, NY 10011
t (212) 337-0680
f (212) 337-0679
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This program is made possible in part by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council; and New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.
