this week in lectures, signings, panel discussions, workshops, and Q&As

FASHION AND FILM: VALERIE AND HER WEEK OF WONDERS

Valerie (Jaroslava Schallerová) comes of age rather early in Valerie and Her Week of Wonders

VALERIE AND HER WEEK OF WONDERS (VALERIE A TÝDEN DIVŮ) (Jaromil Jireš, 1970)
Nitehawk Cinema
136 Metropolitan Ave. between Berry St. & Wythe Ave.
Thursday, August 3, 7:30
Series continues select Thursdays through August 31
718-384-3980
nitehawkcinema.com

Nitehawk Cinema’s “Fashion and Film” series, presented in conjunction with i-D magazine, consists of four movies selected by fashion designers, each preceded by a short “Designers on Their Favorite Films” prerecorded introduction. It kicks off August 3 with Czech New Wave auteur Jaromil Jireš’s (The Cry, The Joke) extremely strange, totally hypnotic Valerie and Her Week of Wonders, chosen by Shane Gabier and Christopher Peters’s Creatures of the Wind. Based on the 1945 Gothic novel by Vítězslav Nezval (which was written ten years earlier), Valerie is a dreamy adult fairy tale, inspired by “Little Red Riding Hood,” “Alice in Wonderland,” and other fables, about the coming of age of Valerie, a nymphette played by thirteen-year-old Jaroslava Schallerová in her film debut. Valerie lives with her icy, regal grandmother, Elsa (Helena Anýzová), in a remote village, where visiting missionaries and actors are cause for celebration. In addition, Valerie’s best friend, Hedvika (Alena Stojáková), is being forced to marry a man she doesn’t love. Valerie, who is in possession of magic earrings, is being courted by the bespectacled, bookish Eaglet (Petr Kopriva) as well as the Constable (Jirí Prýmek), who just happens to be an evil, ugly vampire who has a mysterious past with Elsa. Also showing an untoward interest in the virginal Valerie is the local priest, Gracián (Jan Klusák).

But don’t get too caught up in the hallucinatory narrative, which usually makes little sense. Characters’ motivations are inconsistent and confusing (especially as Jireš delves deeper and deeper into Valerie’s unconscious), plot points come and go with no explanation, and the spare dialogue is often random and inconsequential. And don’t try too hard looking for references to the Prague Spring, colonialism, and communism; just trust that they’re in there. Instead, let yourself luxuriate in Jan Curík’s lush imagery, Lubos Fiser and Jan Klusák’s Baroque score, Ester Krumbachová’s enchanting production design, and Jan Oliva’s weirdly wonderful art direction. Valerie’s white bedroom is enchantingly surreal, a private world in a darkly magical Medieval land beset by incest, rape, fire, murder, self-flagellation, paganism, and monsters, everything dripping with blood and sex. No, this is most definitely not a fantasia for kids. “Fashion and Film” continues August 10 with Gus Van Sant’s To Die For, selected by Adam Selman, August 17 with Sally Potter’s Orlando, chosen by Joseph Altuzarra, and August 31 with Douglas Keeve’s Unzipped, picked by film subject Isaac Mizrahi, who will be on hand to talk about the film and his career.

WHY MAN CREATES — THE WORK OF SAUL BASS

Saul Bass (middle) on the set of his Oscar-winning short Why Man Creates

Metrograph
7 Ludlow St. between Canal & Hester Sts.
Wednesday, August 2, 7:00, and Monday, August 7, 8:45
212-660-0312
metrograph.com

Bronx-born graphic designer Saul Bass had a long and fruitful career designing titles and posters for movies, from 1954’s Carmen to 1995’s Casino, including such all-time greats as Vertigo, The Man with the Golden Arm, Anatomy of a Murder, and Spartacus. He is also responsible for logos for the Girl Scouts, the United Way, Bell Telephone, Geffen Records, AT&T, ALCOA, and many more. But Bass, who passed away in 1996 at the age of seventy-five, was also an Oscar-winning film director, and his legacy is being celebrated on August 2 and 7 at Metrograph with the special program “Why Man Creates — the Work of Saul Bass.” The evening, which will be introduced by visual artist and director Chris Rubino and writer Mayo Simon, is named for Bass’s hugely entertaining 1968 short, Why Man Creates, which won the Academy Award for Best Short Documentary Subject. The twenty-five-minute film traces the history of artistic, scientific, and technological innovation, divided into “The Edifice,” “Fooling Around,” “The Process,” “The Judgment,” “The Search,” and “The Mark” as well as “A Parable” and “A Digression,” using playful animation, an unpredictable score, man-on-the-street interviews, and more, taking on such important issues as hunger, the Big Bang theory, and death, all with a wickedly wry sense of humor. Also on the bill are Bass’s 1980 Oscar-nominated The Solar Film, an early look at solar energy, with Michael Oldfield’s “Tubular Bells” lending it all an Exorcist-like feel; Saul Bass: In His Own Words; a trailer reel; a commercial reel; title sequences; and a special guest. Be sure not to get there late; as Bass, who partnered with his wife, Elaine, on much of his work, noted in a 1977 interview, looking back at the start of his title-designing career, “I had felt for some time that the audience involvement with a film should really begin with the very first frame.” The Bass program, which also includes a week-long revival (August 4-10) of his only full-length feature film, 1974’s Phase IV, is part of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ new year-long residency at Metrograph, which began last week with George Stevens’s A Place in the Sun.

PRISMATIC PARK: NETTA YERUSHALMY

Netta Yerushalmy continues her site-specific Paramodernities series in Madison Square Park in conjunction with Josiah McElheny installation (photo by Paula Lobo)

PARAMODERNITIES #5/FOSSE/EXPERIMENTS
Madison Square Park Oval Lawn
Twenty-Fourth St. between Madison & Fifth Aves.
Tuesday – Sunday, August 1-13, free, 10:00 am – 9:00 pm
www.madisonsquarepark.org
www.nettay.com

From August 1 to 13, New York City–based dancer and choreographer Netta Yerushalmy will continue her ambitious Paramodernities series in Madison Square Park, inhabiting Josiah McElheny’s “Prismatic Park” installation. In June at the National Museum of the American Indian, Yerushalmy presented the second and third parts of the series, in which she reinterprets classic works of dance in multidisciplinary programs: Paramodernities #2 / Trauma, Interdiction, and Agency in “The House of Pelvic Truth,” collaborating with dancer Taryn Griggs and art historian Carol Ockman and featuring a video of Martha Graham’s Night Journey ballet (with Graham as Jocasta, Bertram Ross as Oedipus, and Paul Taylor as Tiresias), and Paramodernities #3 / Revelations — The Afterlives of Slavery, exploring Alvin Ailey’s classic work, joined by Stanley Gambucci, Jeremy Jae Neal, Nicholas Leichter, and Duke University professor Thomas DeFrantz. “Paramodernities is a series of dance experiments that I generate through systematically deconstructing landmark modern dance choreographies,” Yerushalmy, who was born in South Carolina and raised there and in Israel, explained in a statement. “Performed alongside contributions by scholars from different fields in the humanities, who situate these iconic works within the larger project of modernity, Paramodernities explores foundational tenants of modern discourse — such as sovereignty, race, feminism, and nihilism — and includes public discussions as integral parts of each installment.”

Netta Yerushalmy will inhabit Josiah McElhenys Prismatic Park August 1-13 (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

Sponsored by Danspace Project, Yerushalmy’s “Prismatic Park” residency will begin each day (starting at different times) with Paramodernities #5, examining the movement in Bob Fosse’s Sweet Charity, with Megan Williams, Michael Blake, Hsiao-Jou Tang, J’nae Simmons, and Joyce Edwards. That will be followed in the late afternoon or early evening by an experimental group dance with Emily Rose Cannon, Marc Crousillat, Brittany Engel-Adams, Maddie Schimmel, and Gambucci that focuses on the choreographers Yerushalmy has researched for Paramodernities so far (Vaslav Nijinsky, Merce Cunningham, Graham, and Ailey). “For this track, I am choosing to inhabit the park in a way that is perhaps more attuned to the modernist gestures of Josiah’s sculptures and to the park as architecture than to the organic matter there. I’ll be thinking of the determined shape of the lawn as the container for a layered dance-object filled with traces of legacy, gesture, culture,” she explained. And on August 12 at 6:00, the park will host the panel discussion “How Many Modernities Are There?” with McElheny, DeFrantz, Ockman, David Kishik, Judy Hussie-Taylor, and others. All events are free and first come, first served. “Prismatic Park,” which comprises an open red vaulted-roof pavilion, a reflective green dance floor, and a blue sound wall, continues with concerts by Shelley Hirsch (August 22-27), Matana Roberts (September 5-10), and Limpe Fuchs with poet Patrick Rosal (October 3-8), dance by Jodi Melnick (September 12-17, 19-24), and poetry by Joshua Bennett (August 15-20), Donna Masini (August 29 – September 3), and Mónica de la Torre (September 26 – October 1).

THE LAST DALAI LAMA?

Documentary celebrates the eightieth birthday of the Dalai Lama while looking at the future of the lineage

THE LAST DALAI LAMA? (Mickey Lemle, 2016)
IFC Center
323 Sixth Ave. at West Third St.
Opens Friday, July 28
212-924-7771
www.ifccenter.com
www.thelastdalailamafilm.com

“So long space remains, so long sentient beings remain, so long suffering remains, I will remain. In order to serve. That is the real purpose of our life,” His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama says at the beginning of Mickey Lemle’s documentary, The Last Dalai Lama. For nearly 450 years, the spiritual leader of Tibet has been known as the Dalai Lama, reincarnated to continue the lineage and guide the Tibetan people through his wisdom and compassion. But China, in its ongoing suppression of Tibet, has now decided it will choose the next Dalai Lama, so His Holiness, born Tenzin Gyatso in 1935, has vowed that if necessary, he will reincarnate as someone other than a Dalai Lama, bringing an end to the chain. Lemle introduced the world to the 14th Dalai Lama in 1993 with the release of Compassion in Exile: The Story of the 14th Dalai Lama; the new film, which Lemle wrote, produced, directed, and coedited, was made in conjunction with His Holiness’s eightieth birthday, which was celebrated with a Long Life Ceremony at the Javits Center in New York City (that we attended). The film reveals the Dalai Lama, a Buddhist meditation practitioner who escaped Tibet in 1959 and set up a new home in Dharamsala, India, to be both a mensch and a superstar, a man of deep, philosophical wisdom and great compassion for all sentient beings, as well as a very funny man with an infectious laugh. Lemle (The Other Side of the Moon, Ram Dass Fierce Grace) investigates the history of Tibetan relations with China while exploring the biography of the Dalai Lama, including interviews he made with him in the early 1990s.

Lemle speaks with Richen Khando Choegyal of the Tibetan Nuns Project about the self-immolation of young monks as a protest to Chinese policies, visits two classrooms in New York, and meets with HH’s younger brother, Tendzin Choegyal; HH’s personal physician, Tenzin Choedrak; chant master and longtime political prisoner Thupten Chokdhen; Dr. Daniel Goleman, author of A Force for Good: The Dalai Lama’s Vision for Our World; the Very Reverend James Parks Morton and the Very Reverend James A. Kowalski of the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine, where Philip Glass, who composed the film’s score with Tenzin Choegyal, plays the pipe organ; Ling Rinpoche, the reincarnation of the Dalai Lama’s childhood teacher; Buddhist monk Dr. Mathieu Ricard, author of The Monk and the Philosopher: Buddhism Today; and HH’s translator, Dr. Thupten Jinpa. George W. Bush, who was the first U.S. president to make a public appearance with the Dalai Lama, awarding him the Congressional Gold Medal in 2007, shows off his portrait of HH. There’s also an intriguing section, with colorful animation, about the Dalai Lama’s interest in cutting-edge brain science, as he’s funding a project in which Dr. Eve Ekman and her father are creating an “atlas of emotions,” mapping enjoyment, ecstasy, fear, sadness, anguish, disgust, anxiety, and many others. Despite the problems with China, which are only getting worse, the Dalai Lama even has compassion for his enemies. He also discusses how this is not just about Buddhism. “We are working for seven billion human beings,” he tells Dr. Ekman. “That’s my view.” Meanwhile, the Very Reverend Kowalski asks, “Can human beings be this special?” According to His Holiness, every one of us has the potential to reach selfless levels of compassion, empathy, and peace of mind. The film can be scattershot and bumpy, jumping around too much, but the message is clear: Together we can change the world, but we must change ourselves first. The Last Dalai Lama? opens July 28 at IFC, with Lemle participating in Q&As following the 7:25 screenings on Friday and Saturday.

JESÚS “BUBU” NEGRÓN: THE BACK PORTRAIT

the back portrait

On the High Line at 17th St.
July 25-27, free, 2:00 – 7:00
art.thehighline.org
www.jesusbubunegron.com

On streets and in parks all around New York City, tourists pay to get their portraits or caricatures drawn. Puerto Rican sculptor and performance artist Jesús “Bubu” Negrón turns that around, literally and figuratively, in “The Back Portrait,” an ongoing project he conceived in San Juan in 2000 and is coming to the High Line July 25-27. From two o’clock to seven o’clock each day, Negrón will draw, using color markers and crayons, people sitting down with their backs to him. Negrón will give the sitter the original drawing, keeping a photocopy for himself to put on display, calling into question original works of art versus copies. Participation is free and first come, first served. Negrón’s previous work, which often equates “artists” with “artisans,” includes “[Standard memes (campaign for the awareness and activation of the neighborhood)],” in which local residents in San Juan helped revive derelict buildings in their communities via memes, “Honoris Causa,” in which Negrón invited two street vendors to set up their carts inside the Whitney lobby for the 2006 biennial, merging art with a different kind of commerce, and “Banco Marímbula,” a public square bench turned into a musical instrument using parts from a 1957 Victrola.

PRISMATIC PARK: CACONRAD

Poet CAConrad will be giving personalized (Soma)tic poetry rituals in Madison Square Park through July 23 (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

Poet CAConrad will be offering free personalized (Soma)tic poetry rituals in Madison Square Park through July 23 (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

(SOMA)TIC POETRY RITUALS
Madison Square Park Oval Lawn
Twenty-Fourth St. between Madison & Fifth Aves.
Through July 23, free, 12 noon – 5:00 pm (workshops nightly at 6:00)
www.madisonsquarepark.org
caconrad.blogspot.com

“Every single human being is creative. When we commit ourselves to nurturing our artistic capacities we improve our ability to more deeply discern the world around us and make the constructive decisions needed in order to thrive in this world,” fifty-one-year-old poet CAConrad writes in his (Soma)tic Manifesto. Through July 23, Conrad will be performing “(Soma)tic Poetry Rituals” in Madison Square Park, under one of American artist and MacArthur Fellow Josiah McElheny’s three sculptures that comprise “Prismatic Park,” a collaborative public art project that is hosting free dance, music, and poetry through October 8, sponsored by Danspace Project, Blank Forms, and Poets House. Born in Kansas and raised in Pennsylvania, Conrad is the author of such books as The City Real & Imagined, ECODEVIANCE: (Soma)tics for the Future Wilderness, and the upcoming While Standing in Line for Death. In 1998, Conrad’s boyfriend, AIDS activist Earth (Mark Holmes), was brutally raped, tortured, and murdered in Tennessee at the age of thirty-six. In order to break out of his subsequent depression and his inability to break away from a factorylike existence that had been with him since childhood when his family ran a casket company, Conrad developed rituals that helped respark his creative energy and his life in general. He is currently in the midst of a six-day residency in Madison Square Park, sitting (in the shade) at a small table under McElheny’s open red vaulted-roof pavilion (with red and yellow glass), where the public is invited to join him for approximately twenty minutes as Conrad develops a personalized (Soma)tic poetry ritual for each individual participant, involving crystals, liquids, and writing. The rituals are meant to help anyone seeking new ways to cope with today’s world; they are not limited to writers. The personalized rituals — bring pen and paper to take copious notes — are first come, first served, from 12 noon to 5:00, followed by workshops from 6:00 to 8:00; on July 22, Conrad delves into crystal trees, while on July 23 he will read tarot cards. “Prismatic Park,” which also features a blue sound wall and a reflective green dance floor, continues with concerts by Joe McPhee & Graham Lambkin (July 25-30), Shelley Hirsch (August 22-27), Matana Roberts (September 5-10), and Limpe Fuchs with poet Patrick Rosal (October 3-8), dance by Netta Yerushalmy (August 1-6) and Jodi Melnick (September 12-17, 19-24), and poetry by Joshua Bennett (August 15-20), Donna Masini (August 29 – September 3), and Mónica de la Torre (September 26 – October 1).

THE PULITZER AT 100

Junot Diaz talks about winning the Pulitzer in documentary about the coveted prize

THE PULITZER AT 100 (Kirk Simon, 2016)
Lincoln Plaza Cinema
1886 Broadway at 63rd St.
Opens Friday, July 21
212-757-2280
www.thepulitzerat100.com
www.lincolnplazacinema.com

Oscar- and Emmy-winning director Kirk Simon’s The Pulitzer at 100 boasts a remarkable cast and some of the best lines ever written in the history of American arts and letters. It’s also a self-congratulatory bore. Simon celebrates the centennial of the Pulitzer Prize, first awarded by Columbia University in four categories in 1917, by speaking with a vast array of winners from the worlds of journalism (Carl Bernstein, Martin Baron, Thomas Friedman, Nicholas Kristof, Sheri Fink, David Remnick), fiction (Toni Morrison, Michael Chabon, Junot Díaz, Jeffrey Eugenides), drama (Tony Kushner, Paula Vogel, Ayad Akhtar), music (Wynton Marsalis, John Adams), biography (Robert A. Caro), poetry (Yusef Komunyakaa), photography (John Filo, Nick Ut), and more. He also films Martin Scorsese, Helen Mirren, Natalie Portman, Liev Schreiber, John Lithgow, and Yara Shahidi performing selections from the works of some of their favorite writers, including Philip Roth, Harper Lee, and Eugene O’Neill. Interspersed between all of the literary lathering are interesting tidbits — delivered by such historians as Cyrus Patell, Theodore L. Glasser, Roy Harris, and James McGrath Morris — from the life and times of one Joseph Pulitzer, an Austro-Hungarian merchant’s son who came to America as a mercenary to fight in the Civil War. Pulitzer eventually got involved in newspaper publishing, had yellow-journalism battles with William Randolph Hearst, and left money for Columbia to start the Graduate School of Journalism.

Simon lets the prize winners glory in their success, explaining what winning the award meant for their careers; the journalism awardees also delve into the stories they covered to win the trophy, including Kent State, Watergate, Hurricane Katrina, the Vietnam War, Tiananmen Square, and 9/11. While there are some fascinating revelations — particularly by Ut, describing how he took the famous photo of young Vietnamese girl Kim Phuc running from a napalm blast, then poured water over her back to help her (Kim also appears in the film) — most of the news stories are already overly familiar to the viewer, with not enough time to really tackle the subjects properly here. Of course, that’s not really what the film is centrally about, anyway. And it gets especially glib when several of the winners poke fun at the physical award itself, as if it’s really no big deal. Meanwhile, the performances by the stellar actors are far too serious and feel like their readings are just time fillers. Simon (Chimps: So Like Us, Strangers No More) can’t seem to decide what kind of film he’s making. It would have been more interesting learning further about Pulitzer himself rather than listening to terrific writers lavish praise on themselves, their colleagues, and their forebears. Oh, the film, which has no voice-over narration, does put to rest one important part of the Pulitzer legacy: Only one of the speakers says “Pyew-litzer,” while all the others pronounce Joseph’s last name as “Pull-itzer.” The Pulitzer at 100 opens July 21 at Lincoln Plaza, with Simon participating in Q&As at the 7:00 shows on Friday and Saturday night.