Rituals for the Dead and Living

Cyclical magic and mythic imaginaries link the films of four interdisciplinary artists who document the movements of individual and collective bodies.

our songs were ready for all wars to come (2021)
Dir. Noor Abed
20 min, digital
In Arabic with English subtitles

Noor Abed’s haunted choreography translates Palestinian folk tales into grainy Super 8, accompanied by the voice of singer Maya Khald. The short film meditates on communal rituals associated with disappearance, mourning, and death, rewriting the history and present of a people and their land while reflecting on the film itself as a form of mediation.

Ritual in Transfigured Time (1946)
Dir. Maya Deren
15 min, digital

In Maya Deren’s film, the ritual of a look and the ritual of social gathering weave together in a symbolic world of gesture. Solemnly silent, Ritual in Transfigured Time is a psychodrama of bodies in motion that reflects Deren’s intensely choreographic approach to cinema.

Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome (1954)
Dir. Kenneth Anger
38 min, digital

Decadent, provocative, and surreal, this work fuses Soviet montage, baroque opulence, and non-narrative symbolism to present a fever-dream masquerade of revelers staging occult ceremonies of magic and ecstatic eroticism.

Without Your Interpretation (1983)
Dir. Ulysses Jenkins
14 min, digital

In the early 1980s, Ulysses Jenkins documented a twilight dance in downtown Los Angeles. Playing with the then-emergent music video format, he intercut choreography by the Rudy Perez troupe—as well as the artists Senga Nengudi and Maren Hassinger—with found footage of musical performances and news media, orchestrating a sharp critique of American culture and militarism.