Anthology Film Archives

Film Screenings / Programs / Retrospectives

CONSTRUCTIONS/DESTRUCTIONS/INSTRUCTIONS: THE FILMS OF GORDON MATTA-CLARK

March 1 – March 2

With the support of the Gordon Matta-Clark Estate and Electronic Arts Intermix, Anthology hosts two programs showcasing the films of the anarchitectural pioneer Gordon Matta-Clark. The screenings draw a link between Matta-Clark’s famed “building cuts” and the cinematic apparatus that’s documented in these films, concerned as they are with the metaphorical meaning of the “cut” and the possibilities discovered when light contaminates a new plane. These films demonstrate the breadth of Matta-Clark’s mandate, spanning not just film and architecture but sculpture, dance, and performance. In each case, they seek to emphasize the thinness of the divisions between people, spaces, and disciplines. With sledgehammer, chainsaw, and his own two feet, Matta-Clark perforated these walls and broke them down, revealing a vertiginous abundance of meaning lurking in the conjunctions. These eleven films were all shot between 1971 and 1977, a testament to the urgency of Matta-Clark’s project, which has only increased in the decades since his early death in 1978.

Guest-programmed by Dylan Adamson with the assistance of Jessamyn Fiore of the Gordon Matta-Clark Estate and Electronic Arts Intermix. Research assistance provided by the Canadian Centre for Architecture.

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