A performance structured around an absence - the filmmaker Chantal Akerman (1950-2015), represented on stage by her first film and excerpts from one of her books - and a presence - the stellar cellist Sonia Wieder-Atherton, her companion and collaborator for many years, who "imagined" this dialogue: "I wanted to play along with her, her every move, her silences, her dancing at once burlesque and deadly serious, her anxiety as she is humming little tunes. Tracking her, surprising her, surprising myself at each step. It begins with Bartok's Sonata for Solo Violin (1944), transcribed here for the cello. This is followed by a child's voice singing softly at first, then getting louder: Chantal's voice in Saute ma ville (1968)....After the explosion A Family in Brussels (1998) gently slips its way between the notes and the images..." (Sonia Wieder-Atherton) - Bérénice Reynaud
In person: Sonia Wieder-Atherton
"Chantal Akerman moves forward, frontally and almost blindly, radically redefining the role of the filmic image. Without models nor methods, turning the dark hole of her history into a stupendous ability to inhabit time, she has made cinema a true 'art of the shot'."
- France Culture
"Watching Sonia Wieder-Atherton play is like watching Rudolf Nureyev dance. Her instrument is as much a part of her body as her arms or legs, and she makes it sing in a way that would seem impossible from anyone else." - Time Out New York
Presented in collaboration with the California Institute of the Arts School of Music, Zena Zezza, the Northwest Film Center, Third Angle New Music,Portland's Regional Arts & Culture Council, Northwest Film Forum, and On the Boards.
Funded in part by the Ostrovsky Family Fund. Curated by Steve Anker and Bérénice Reynaud, as part of the Jack H. Skirball Series.