Luther Price: Poetry of the Found

Luther Price

Luther Price in person!

Filmforum is delighted to host Luther Price, one of the pre-eminent artist filmmakers of the past thirty years.  But very little of his work has screened in Los Angeles. That’s because he brings the only copies and screens them in person, and that’s it. No DVD screeners, no Vimeo links.  Sure, he can send you a print to include in a group show, but that hasn’t happened much.  He hasn’t been in L.A. for at least a decade, and this time he’s here for three completely different shows, with the Filmforum show being the second. He’ll be screening a set of films drawing upon found footage to create amazing meditations on life, pain, beauty, and art.

What will be at the Filmforum screening?  Here’s what Luther says:

“All of the films we will screen deal with found footage…this batch is from mid 2000…in 2003, i decided to work completely with found footage, leaving behind what was turning into an auto biographical night mare…i stopped shooting film…found footage became a way for me to still talk about issues…but not destroy me …i could remove myself enough........with out a direct relationship…it would also open me to something beyond my own conflicts…and gain a wider perspective ....... before that, ......most of my thoughts and films were about my family…cancer hit my family…in 1996…by 2001 .....i lost my sister , father , then , mother…but during this time, i made a series of films about all of that…it was a very depressing time in my life…after  my mother died in 2001.....i stopped writing in my journal and put down my camera…i was tired of making cancer films abut my family…i knew if I picked up a camera ,...it would just go on and on…i thought …go in to a candy store and film candy…clowns…cute animals…anything but cancer…anything but my family…

“In 2003 , i decided to move forward a pick things up again…and try to keep my own personal past behind me…i didn’t want to stop making film but the path i was on was very unhealthy…but at the same time , i felt i still needed to explore pain and hurt…and human content…but remove myself enough…so i could still feel but not be consumed …with found footage ,...i could do that and move on…and perhaps instead of always seeing the bleak…find something wonderful …open my eyes and take life in…there will always be pain…but there is so much beauty too…even more so when we realize how fragile life is…and that life and it's moments become the key to who we are…it's all we have.....just a memory of a life we left behind…….luther”

Tickets: $10 general, $6 students/seniors; free for Filmforum members.  Available by credit card in advance from Brown Paper Tickets at http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/605977 or at the door.

Luther Price is an experimental filmmaker, sculpture and performance artist whose work has been widely screened in the United States and Europe at such venues as the Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, The ICA Boston, The Wexner Center, The San Francisco Cinematheque, The Toronto International Film Festival and the Oberhausen Film Festival. His work was featured prominently in the 2012 Whitney Biennial. Roberta Smith of the New York Times called him "one of the Biennial's stars." His films are distributed by Canyon Cinema in San Francisco, The Film-Makers' Cooperative in New York, and Light Cone in Paris. He is represented by Callicoon Fine Arts.

Luther Price is doing two different screenings while in Los Angeles,

Saturday April 5 at the Echo Park Film Center:

 http://www.echoparkfilmcenter.org/cinema/schedule.html

Monday April 7 at REDCAT: Body and Flesh: The Tactile Cinema of Luther Price

http://www.redcat.org/event/luther-price

A nice portrait of Luther Price from the Whitney Biennial in 2012:

http://youtu.be/vLjBW09BiiY

And a written portrait of Luther’s works by Andrew Lampert:

http://bombmagazine.org/article/6622/luther-price