Amber Cortes’ work in “Arctic Book Club” at EFA

UnionDocs — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 13:53:58 +0000

Amber Cortes, who, among many other things, keeps our screenings organized here at UnionDocs, is in a group show this month at the EFA Project Space in mid-town. Though she most often works in audio, this piece involved involves an appropriation of Robert Flaherty’s moving imagery, which is re-edited and set to an new soundtrack. See her letter to friends below and stop by the show, which runs until October 24th..

Hello Everyone:

For the past few months, I’ve been participating in a kind of art experiment: a book club in which artists of all different genres first discuss, and then respond to the book by creating a project. The book, ‘An African in Greenland,’ is about a man who travels from Togo to Greenland- and the adventures he encounters along this unique journey.

Our gallery exhibit opens next Thursday, September 17th, from 6-8pm at the EFA Space in Manhattan, featuring all kinds of art: sculptures, paintings, installations, photographs and videos- each piece inspired by the book. My installation, ‘Retold Journeys,’ is a video and sound installation that interleaves text from ‘An African in Greenland’ with footage from one of the earliest documentary films ever made, Nanook of the North by Robert Flaherty. The sound piece is an imagined arctic landscape found simultaneously above and below the surface of ice: linking the film images to an internal atmosphere of reflection that comes with traveling and encountering new cultures and places.

More information is below or at:
http://www.fluxfactory.org/an-african-in-greenland/

Take care and stay tuned,
AC

Documentary Film, Radio, Photography | Presentation + Production | Williamsburg, Brooklyn » uniondocs staff

Amber Cortes’ work in “Arctic Book Club” at EFA