Shirley Clarke 100: A Retrospective
Celebrating what would have been the 100th birthday of American filmmaker Shirley Clarke in 2019, Antenna is proud to present a retrospective program featuring three of her most compelling feature documentaries, alongside four short films by the maverick director.
Born in New York, and later ensconced in the city’s independent film scene centred around Greenwich Village, Clarke began her artistic endeavours as an avant-garde dancer, before turning her talents to the screen. It’s little wonder, then, that this luminary figure in American New Wave cinema chose a choreographic theme for her first short film, the award-winning Dance in the Sun (1953). Her poetic rendering of the scene won instant acclaim, garnering comparisons to Maya Deren.
As her career progressed and her political consciousness grew, Clarke began to focus on social issues, but always carried through her kinetic sensibility and a desire to find distinctive forms of expression. She was praised for her graphic and unglamorous depiction of drug use in The Connection; her revelatory portrayal of issues like racism, homophobia, parental abuse and male sex work in Portrait of Jason; and her ingenious weaving of archival footage, video art and architecture into a vibrant collage illustrating the genius of a free-jazz icon for Ornette: Made in America.
Alongside that final feature from Clarke’s career, we have also chosen to screen the final short she made, 1982’s Tongues, which was her master stroke of collaboration: a fusion of video and theatre with actor Joseph Chaikin, Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Sam Shepard and the ground-breaking director herself.
Blurring the line between fact and fiction, Clarke’s experimental and sometimes controversial works were both criticised and lauded, embroiling her in censorship battles while also winning her 1953’s Oscar for Best Documentary.
It could be argued Clarke’s works were designed to unsettle people, so it’s a testament to her visionary approach that many of the director’s films are held in high regard by audiences, critics and fellow filmmakers/artists alike.