Screenings

Film Screening: ‘Agnes Martin: With My Back to the World’ > December 7th

This moving documentary on the internationally renowned painter Agnes Martin was shot over a period of four years, from 1998 through 2002. Interviews with Martin are intercut with shots of her working in her studio located in Taos, New Mexico, with photographs and archival footage, and images of her artwork spanning over five decades. The film is a venue for Martin to speak about her work, her working methods, her life as an artist, and her views about the creative process. Dir. Mary Lance, 2002, 57 mins. Registration essential. Esker Foundation is proud to partner with Sidewalk Citizen on our film series. The bakery is generously providing complimentary treats inspired by each film screening this fall.

Visual AIDS Day With(out) Art: Alternate Endings, Activist Rising > December 2nd

Visual AIDS’ longstanding Day With(out) Art Project

ALTERNATE ENDINGS, ACTIVIST RISINGS is the 29th iteration of Visual AIDS’ longstanding Day With(out) Art Project. Highlighting the impact of art in contemporary AIDS activism and advocacy, the program features new short videos from six inspiring community organizations and collectives—ACT UP NY, Positive Women’s Network, Sero Project, The SPOT, Tacoma Action Collective, and VOCAL NY. ALTERNATE ENDINGS, ACTIVIST RISINGS seeks to reflect the persisting urgencies of today’s HIV/AIDS epidemic, including HIV criminalization, Big Pharma, homelessness, and the disproportionate effects of HIV on marginalized communities. At a moment of growing interest in the histories of AIDS activism, ALTERNATE ENDINGS, ACTIVIST RISINGS foregrounds contemporary engagements between activists, artists, and cultural workers on the front lines. 60 minutes. Registration essential.

Film Screening: ‘Gabriel’ > November 23rd

In 1976, Agnes Martin filmed Gabriel, her only completed cinematic work. Photographed in California, Colorado, and New Mexico with an Aeroflex camera, it follows a ten-year-old boy, played by Peter Mayne, as he wanders aimlessly across varied landscapes. These scenes are interspersed with sequences of running creeks, fields of flowers, and excerpts of Bach’s Goldberg Variations. For Martin, her film was about “happiness, innocence, and beauty…it’s about this little boy who climbs a mountain and all the beautiful things he sees” and was made “to protest the commercial films being negative, [those that are] about deception and deceit and violence.” The title references the Biblical Archangel, Gabriel, who symbolized purity. Dir. Agnes Martin, 1976, 78 mins. Registration essential. Esker Foundation is proud to partner with Sidewalk Citizen on our film series. The bakery is generously providing complimentary treats inspired by each film screening this fall.

Film Screening: ‘Citizen Jane: Battle for the City’ > March 9th

In 1960, Jane Jacobs’s book The Death and Life of Great American Cities sent shockwaves through the architecture and planning worlds, with its exploration of the consequences of modern planners’ and architects’ reconfiguration of cities. Jacobs was also an activist, who was involved in many fights in mid-century New York, to stop “master builder” Robert Moses from running roughshod over the city. This film retraces the battles for the city as personified by Jacobs and Moses, as urbanization moves to the very front of the global agenda. This film sets out to examine the city of today though the lens of one of its greatest champions. Dir. Matt Tyrnauer, 2017, 92 mins. Registration essential. Esker Foundation is proud to partner with Sidewalk Citizen on the presentation of this film. The bakery is generously providing complimentary treats created in response to the film. Coincidentally, the novel by Jane Jacobs was the inspiration for the naming of the bakery.