Chitra Ganesh, “Dakini Eclipse,” mixed media on paper, 2018 (courtesy of the artist)
Rubin Museum of Art
West 17th St. between Sixth & Seventh Aves.
Friday, May 4, $10-$15, 6:00 – 11:20
Programs continue through June
Exhibitions run through November 4 and January 7
rubinmuseum.org
www.chitraganesh.com
The Rubin Museum is handing over much of its always fascinating programming for May and June to innovative multimedia artist and Brooklyn native Chitra Ganesh, whose “drawing-based practice brings to light narrative representations of femininity, sexuality, and power typically absent from canons of literature and art,” as explained in her artist statement. In February, the Rubin opened Ganesh’s “The Scorpion Gesture,” featuring magical large-scale animated interventions in the “Gateway to Himalayan Art” and “Masterworks” exhibitions, and “Face of the Future,” a fellowship program consisting of new works on paper and collage-based pieces by Ganesh in addition to contributions from emerging artists Maia Cruz Palileo, Nontsikelelo Mutiti, Tammy Nguyen, Jagdeep Raina, Sahana Ramakrishnan, Anuj Shrestha, and Tuesday Smillie. On Friday, May 4, Ganesh will be at the museum for “Celebrate Chitra Ganesh: A Night with DJ Rekha, Special Tours, and Performances,” including a dialogue with the art collective BUFU, remarks by Ganesh, docent-led tours of Ganesh’s two shows, a performance by Jacolby Satterwhite (Blessed Avenue), a dance party in the K2 Lounge with DJ Rekha, and a screening of Fred M. Wilcox’s 1956 sci-fi classic, Forbidden Planet, introduced by Ganesh.
Chitra Ganesh will participate in a series of special events at the Rubin Museum (photo courtesy Brooklyn Museum)
Ganesh, a Rubin Museum Future Fellow whose “Eyes of Time” was on view at the Brooklyn Museum in 2015, has also selected the films and speakers for the Cabaret Cinema “Face of the Future” series, which continues May 11 with Gojira (Godzilla) (Ishiro Honda, 1954), introduced by Nguyen; May 18 with Ghost in the Shell (Mamoru Oshii, 1995), introduced by Ramakrishnan; June 8 with Born in Flames (Lizzie Borden, 1983), introduced by Smillie; and June 22 with Barbarella (Roger Vadim, 1968), introduced by Palileo. In addition, there will be a series of conversations pairing scientific and legal experts with artists and activists, beginning May 9 with “The Future of Feminism” with Linda Sarsour and Ganesh and continuing May 16 with “The Future of Transformation with Qasim Naqvi,” May 23 with “The Future of Evidence” with Alexis Agathocleous and Elizabeth Phelps, May 30 with “The Future of Science Fiction” with Nisi Shawl and the Otolith Group, June 6 with “The Future of #Mood” with Janelle James and Richard Friedman, June 13 with “The Future of Mythology” with Mimi Mondal and Ganesh, June 20 with “The Future of Responsibility” with the Guerrilla Girls and Ganesh, and June 27 with “The Future of Justice” with sujatha baliga and Robert Yazzie.
Tamer El Said’s extraordinary debut feature, In the Last Days of the City, is an elegiac love letter to his deeply troubled hometown, Cairo, as well as a treatise on the responsibilities filmmakers have to their art and to society as a whole. Almost ten years in the making, the film was shot between 2008 and 2010, finishing shortly before the Arab Spring uprising in January 2011 in Tahrir Square, and was not completed and screened until 2016, when it started winning prizes at festivals around the world. It finally receives its New York theatrical release at the Museum of the Modern Art, running April 27 through May 3, where El Said will take part in a postscreening conversation on opening night at 7:00; in addition, on April 30 at 7:00, MoMA’s “Modern Mondays” series will present 
The behind-the-scenes story of the making of Duck Butter, having its final world premiere screening at the Tribeca Film Festival on April 26 before opening at the Village East the next day, turns out to be better than the film itself. That doesn’t mean there isn’t lots to appreciate about the too-intimate drama, which chronicles the ups and downs, fears and desires of two women experiencing a full relationship in a twenty-four-hour period. Director Miguel Arteta (Beatriz at Dinner, Chuck & Buck) and actress Alia Shawkat (State of Grace, Arrested Development) initially wrote a script about an eighteen-month relationship between a man and a woman that featured a twenty-four-hour period in which they get to know each other by having sex once every sixty minutes. One friend advised that they instead make the movie just about the twenty-four hours, so they began looking for a male actor to star opposite Shawkat. After coming up empty, they decided that Laia Costa (Bandolera, Victoria), who had already been cast in a smaller role, was right for the part. They stripped the script down to its bare essentials, allowing the two actresses to improvise most of their dialogue as the main section of the film was claustrophobically photographed by Hillary Spera in about twenty-seven hours, giving it a cinéma vérité feel. 
Don’t be scared off by the title of House Two; it’s not a sequel to a horror film you didn’t see. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t downright frightening. On November 19, 2005, the Haditha Massacre took place, in which a small unit of U.S. Marines shot and killed two dozen Iraqis, including women and children, in a bedroom in a location identified as “House Two.” The Marines were searching for those responsible for setting off an IED nearby. The next year, following a Time magazine story about the incident, Oscar-nominated, Emmy-winning director Michael Epstein decided to make a film about the trial of Staff Sergeant Frank Wuterich, who was charged with eighteen counts of murder. In order to get as much behind-the-scenes information as possible without having to surrender it to the court or the military, Epstein actually became an official part of Wuterich’s defense team, gaining full access to its strategy and all those involved, beginning with Wuterich himself. In exchange, the legal team agreed that Epstein would have ownership of all footage he shot and that he could use it in any way he saw fit; thus, he had complete control over the documentary, and the legal team would even indemnify him for any resulting libel claims from them or Wuterich. What Epstein found out about the case is utterly shattering, a widespread conspiracy to cover up the incident — which recalled the 1968 My Lai Massacre in Vietnam — with a shocking revelation of who was ultimately in charge of the whitewashing.
