[Frameworks] LPA Cinema Series, Meet the Maker: Amy Ruhl

[amy ruhl]

Meet the Maker

Amy Ruhl will screen and discuss her fantastical biopic
HOW MATA HARI
LOST HER HEAD AND FOUND HER BODY (2011)

Thursday, October 18, 2012, 6:00pm

Third Floor Screening Room
The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts
Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center
40 Lincoln Center Plaza

Amy Ruhl’s work is an imaginary biography of a real
historical figure: the erotic dancer and courtesan
executed by firing squad for double espionage in World
War I. Reinventing the archetypal femme fatale according
to her corporeal afterlife – Hari was decapitated after her
execution, her body donated to anatomical study and her
head displayed at the Musee d’Anatomie – Ruhl imagines
her as a striptease artist whose ability to remove her
head takes Belle Époque Paris by storm. Using Oscar
Wilde’s Salome as a site for narrative and historical
interaction, the film draws upon the cultural phenomenon
of “Salomania” among largely lesbian and bisexual
female performers in order to engage with an era when
Orientalism sold, scandal became success, and deviant
desires equaled a crime punishable by death

Ruhl’s work engages with sources ranging from George
Meliès’ “trick films,” to Nazimova’s Salome (Dance of the
Seven Veils) to Vera Chytilova’s phantasmagoria scene
in Daisies, one of the most lauded Czech New Wave
films. She will present examples of these influences and
discuss how they have informed her latest short film, How
Mata Hari Lost Her Head and Found Her Body,which was
made in part by collaging early film footage together with live action
animation.

*
*
*
*

-- 
Amy Ruhl
http://www.amyruhlfilm.com
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: https://mailman-mail5.webfaction.com/pipermail/frameworks/attachments/20121017/f1bb162c/attachment.html