Experience curated screenings from the Library's 16mm film collection and participate in guided discussions about film, history, and archives. This month we will be treated to a selection of 16mm films from the collection of Miami artist Kevin Arrow. See the longer event listing for details on the films to be screened. For more information, please contact the library at 305-375-5572 or specialcollections@mdpls.org. All ages.
About the guest curator
Kevin Arrow (he/him/his) is a multifaceted artist and cultural producer living and working in Miami, Florida. His work has been exhibited in South Florida since the mid-1980s and is in the permanent collections of the Museum of Contemporary Art, North Miami (MOCA), the Perez Art Museum Miami (PAMM), and the Bass Museum of Art, Miami Beach.
Throughout Arrow’s professional career, his work has taken on various forms, including drawing, collage, painting, film, publishing, and audio-visual projects, merging his interest in obsolete media, archival tendencies, sacred geometry, and the ephemeral object.
For this month's screening, he's selected the following films:
NEW YORK GRAFFITI EXPERIENCE, 1976 by Fenton Lawless
18 minutes color/sound
A rare glimpse into the early years of New York City's graffiti community. Filmed six years before the influential movie Style Wars in 1982 and eight years before the release of the 1984 book Subway Art, New York Graffiti Experience has been long considered the holy grail document of NYC graffiti.
BLACK MAGIC, 1985-87 by Stan Hughes
6 minutes color/sound
Black Magic is a six minute animation based on a cycle of drawings "in-betweened" from seven inkblot drawings made by Stan Hughes. 100% hand drawn, painted and animated between 1985 and 1987.
FRANK FILM, 1973 by Frank Mouris
8 minutes 51 seconds color/sound
Frank Mouris assembles 11,592 real-life collages to create a moving, one-of-a-kind masterpiece of animation. This animated short features two soundtracks - in one, Frank narrates an autobiography, in the other, he reads off a list of words beginning with the letter "F" (from furniture to fame and fortune). Tying the two soundtracks together and influencing their subject matter is the animated collage of photos collected from magazines - all arranged by theme and each theme merging into the next. Academy Award Winner, Best Animated Short Film.
BINARY BIT PATTERNS, 1969 by Michael Whitney
3 minutes color/sound
A masterpiece of early computer animation shows a Persian-like pattern optically printed from digital computer-generated images synched to a psychedelic soundtrack by Michael Whitney and Charles Villiers. Binary Bit Patterns is a delightful burst of vibrant colour, movement and sound, exploring the graphic variations of simple patterns. #hypnotic
About the Division of Special Collections & Archives
Miami-Dade Public Library System’s Division of Special Collections & Archives holds rare and irreplaceable historical documents for the benefit of the public and scholarly community. They oversee the Helen Muir Florida Collection, 16mm Film Collection, Cuban Collection of Rare Books & Ephemera, Genealogy Collection, Vasari Project, and rare & antiquarian books from as early as the 17th century. The Division's primary goal is to provide the public with the contents of the vault at their request. Its collections include rare books, original manuscripts, over 18,000 photographs, prints, artifacts, audiovisual resources, and electronic media.
About the Film Collection
The 16mm film collection has been part of the Library's holdings for over 55 years. Its first films were part of the City of Miami’s public library and began in the 1960s before there was a county library system. When MDPLS was formed, the County supplemented its local funding for films with Federal LSCA grants (Library Services and Construction Act). Apart from leased feature films, all films were purchased for free exhibition for the life of the print. Subjects within the collection include experimental/avant-garde art films, non-narrated films, children’s films, Black history, Floridiana, and local history. Today, there are over 4,000 films within the collection.
AGE GROUP: | All Ages |
EVENT TYPE: | Special Event | Special Collections | Performances & Presentations | Movies |