On October 10, 2019 Block Cinema joined with Northwestern’s MA in Sound Arts and Industries to welcome Academy-Award-Winning Sound Designer Gary Rydstrom for a discussion of David ‘s Lynch’s 1980 classic The Elephant Man. Although noted for its evocative black and white cinematography and for John Hurt’s sensitive and powerful performance as Merrick, the film’s […]
In September 2019 the Block Museum welcomed Simran Bhalla as a 2019-2020 graduate fellow. Block Museum Graduate Fellowships are offered to two graduate students annually, one from Art History and one from any department within the Graduate School. Graduate Fellows are integral members of the museum staff and support projects through exhibition and collection research, curating, writing […]
Ism Ism Ism is the first major survey of Latin American experimental cinema in U.S. The Block Museum of Art at Northwestern University has announced that it will bring the groundbreaking film program “Ism, Ism, Ism: Experimental Cinema in Latin America (Ismo, Ismo, Ismo: Cine experimental en América Latina)” to Chicago Oct. 3 to Nov. 16 […]
Since the 1960s, experimental filmmaker Nathaniel Dorsky has been making a distinctive and stunning body of work. His silent 16mm films are lyrical explorations of the world around him, focused on the textures, colors, and rhythms of everyday objects and movements. His sharp eye for details reveals the small moments of beauty and wonder to […]
Local filmmaker and Northwestern professor Kyle Henry’s Rogers Park captures the life, diversity, and flavor of the northside Chicago neighborhood in its story of two couples as they attempt to keep their relationships afloat. Henry and screenwriter Carlos Treviño craft a film that is both universal in its characters’ raw and authentic emotional lives and […]
The Block Museum of Art’s exhibition Up Is Down: Mid-Century Experiments in Advertising and Film at the Goldsholl Studio, is the result of remarkable partnerships including a collaboration with the Chicago Film Archives. The Chicago Film Archives have been working over ten years to archive, house and preserve the films of Mort and Millie Goldsholl. […]
The Terra Foundation for American Art announced on June 29, 2017 a broad slate of grants given in support of Art Design Chicago, a wide-ranging initiative the Foundation is spearheading to explore Chicago’s vibrant creative history and enduring influence on art and design. Terra leadership confirmed 33 grants for Art Design Chicago projects given to 31 cultural organizations […]
A roundtable discussion of Annual New York Avant Garde Festivals, moderated by Hannah Higgins, professor of art history at University of Illinois at Chicago, and featuring Carolee Schneemann, multidisciplinary artist who transformed the discourse of the body, sexuality, and gender; Alison Knowles, multi-media Fluxus artist; Jim McWilliams, designer of most of the posters for the […]
Mimi Brody, Film Curator at Block Cinema, reports back on the Toronto International Film Festival Last week I returned from the Toronto International Film Festival, one of the most important annual film events of the year and a major showcase for new contemporary international cinema. I spent a week at the Festival and saw 38 […]
A foundational figure of the “New Arab Cinema” movement that began in the 1970s, Moumen Smihi (born in Tangier, Morocco in 1945) is one of the most important Arab filmmakers working today, whose exceptional films are as fearless in their politics as they are quietly radical in form. With recent screenings at Cannes, Marrakech, and […]