International Play Reading Festival: Playwright Panel Discussion
Playwrights Blanca Domenech (Spain), Pablo Manzi (Chile), Blandine Savetier (France), and Waddah Saab (France) in conversation with Columbia University School of the Arts International Play Reading Festival Director David Henry Hwang, Theatre.
International Play Reading Festival Translator Panel Discussion: How Did This Play Get into English?
In this brief conversation, Taylor Gaines (translator of Snow by Blandine Savetier and Waddah Saab) and Caridad Svich (playwright and translator of many plays from Spanish) will speak about the challenges of bringing the Festival’s three plays into English.
International Play Reading Festival: You Shall Love
In the near future, a group of facilitators in the surgical community build a presentation about how to break down the cultural and racial bias against Amenites—a newly-arrived alien species.
International Play Reading Festival: The Sickness of Stone
Blanca Domenech is an award-winning Spanish playwright. She is the recipient of the Calderón de la Barca National Award and the Spanish Playwrights Association Prize (AAT).
International Play Reading Festival: Snow
When Ka, a respected poet and journalist living in exile in Germany, returns to his homeland in Kars, Turkey to report on the increase in suicides among young Muslim women, he is swept into a cascade of conflict, corruption, and zealotry among competing factions of the region.
New Plays Festival: Chinese Opera and a Modern Drama
A thousand years ago, Madame Huarui was the Chinese version of Helen of Troy, with her life beyond her control. In 2019, Kiki, a New York-based stage manager, is hired to work on a new Beijing Opera featuring Madame Huarui, while her professional and personal life is deeply affected by her uncertain Visa status. Chinese Opera and A Modern Drama explores patriarchy in both historical times and nowadays, as well as new immigrants living under the current political climate between the US and China.
Directing Thesis: The Historical Range of Ursus Americanus
A man and a dancing bear roam a desolate Alaska. Three women spread across the country claim what's theirs. A young boy fights his unquenchable thirst. Traversing a landscape of unpredictable weather, crumbling infrastructure, and uncertain survival, The Historical Range of Ursus Americanus explores what remains after the climate has changed.
Ann Hamilton
Ann Hamilton is internationally acclaimed for her large-scale multimedia installations, public projects, and performance collaborations. Chorus, a marble mosaic of text from the Declaration of Independence and the 1948 United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, was recently installed in New York City’s Cortlandt Street subway station — destroyed on 9/11 and reopened in 2018.
Kit Noir Film Festival: 'Rear Window'
This screening is part of The Second Annual Dr. Saul and Dorothy Kit Film Noir Festival
Kit Noir Film Festival: 'The Bride Wore Black' (La Mariée était en noir)
This screening is part of The Second Annual Dr. Saul and Dorothy Kit Film Noir Festival
Kit Noir Film Festival: The Boy, the Bachelor and the Bride: Adaptation as Variation in 'The Window,' 'Rear Window,' and 'The Bride Wore Black'
This screening is part of The Second Annual Dr. Saul and Dorothy Kit Film Noir Festival
Kit Noir Film Festival: ‘The Window’
This screening is part of The Second Annual Dr. Saul and Dorothy Kit Film Noir Festival
Kit Noir Film Festival: 'The Chase'
This screening is part of The Second Annual Dr. Saul and Dorothy Kit Film Noir Festival
Kit Noir Film Festival: 'The Leopard Man' and 'Return of the Whistler'
This screening is part of The Second Annual Dr. Saul and Dorothy Kit Film Noir Festival
Kit Noir Film Festival: "Woolrich Noir" and the B Film
This screening is part of The Second Annual Dr. Saul and Dorothy Kit Film Noir Festival
Kit Noir Film Festival: 'The Guilty' and 'Fall Guy'
This screening is part of The Second Annual Dr. Saul and Dorothy Kit Film Noir Festival
Kit Noir Film Festival: 'Black Angel'
This screening is part of The Second Annual Dr. Saul and Dorothy Kit Film Noir Festival
Kit Noir Film Festival: 'Deadline at Dawn' and 'Nightmare' (Double Feature)
This screening is part of The Second Annual Dr. Saul and Dorothy Kit Film Noir Festival
Directing Thesis: Hadrian & Antinous
Hadrian & Antinous unearths an ancient story, adds a modern voice and speaks to what it is to love, to mourn, and to remember those who have been forgotten.
Max Ritvo Poetry Series: Brenda Hillman
The annual Max Ritvo Poetry Series is organized in memory of Max Ritvo ’16, author of Four Reincarnations and The Final Voicemails, and co-author of Letters from Max.
Directing Thesis: As You Like It
Columbia University School of the Arts was proud to present Mikhaela Mahony’s (Columbia MFA Directing Candidate 2019) production of As You Like It.
Legacies of Leftism Conference, Day 2
8:30 am – Registration – Lenfest Lobby
Welcome: 9:00 am Francesco Cassetti, Thomas E. Donnelley Professor of Humanities and Professor of Film, Yale University, Permanent Seminar on Histories of Film Theories
Panel 5: 9:15 am – 10:30 am
Chair: Noam Elcott, Associate Professor and Chair of Art Humanities, Columbia University
Alexander Zahlten, Associate Professor of EALAC, Harvard University: “From Media Environment to Media Ecology: Leftist Media Theory and the 1970s Occult Boom in Japan”
Franz Prichard, Assistant Professor of East Asian Studies, Princeton University: “Naked-Eye Reflex: Materiality and Mediation in Nakahira Takuma’s Photographic Praxis”
Respondent: Nick Kapur, Assistant Professor of History, Rutgers-Camden
Coffee Break – 10:30 am – 10:55 am – The Lantern – 8th floor
Panel 6: 11:00 am – 12:15 pm: Power & Precarity
Chair: Eugenia Lean, Associate Professor, East Asian Languages & Cultures; Director, Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
Victor Fan, Senior Lecturer of Film Studies, King’s College London: “Hong Kong 1967: Cinemas of Political Precarity––Then and Now”
Lingzhen Wang, Associate Professor of East Asian Studies, Brown University: “Socialist Feminism and Chinese Women's Mainstream Experimental Cinema”
Respondent: Liang Luo, Associate Professor of Chinese Literature and Culture, University of Kentucky
12:15 pm – 1:45 pm – Lunch Break
Panel 7: 1:45 pm – 3:00 pm: Colonial/Post-Colonial
Chair: Claudia Breger, Villard Professor of German and Comparative Literature, Columbia University
Travis Workman, Associate Professor of Asian Languages & Literatures, Univ. of Minnesota: "The Problem of Repetition in Colonial and Postcolonial Korean Film and Film Theory"
Moonim Baek, Professor of Korean Language and Literature, Yonsei University: “Leftist Invention of Tradition: Colonial Korean Case”
Respondent: Theodore Hughes, Korea Foundation Professor of Korean Studies, East Asian Literature and Culture, Columbia University
Coffee Break: 3:00 pm – 3:25 pm – Lenfest, The Lantern, 8th floor
Panel 8: 3:30 – 4:45 pm: Technique, Technology and Visuality
Chair: Paul Anderer, Mack Professor of Humanities & Professor of Japanese Literature, Columbia University
Aaron Gerow, Professor of Film Studies and East Asian Languages and Literatures, Yale University: “Miura Tsutomu’s Anti-Montage Dialectics”
Takuya Tsunoda, Assistant Professor of Japanese Cinema and Media, East Asian Languages and Cultures, Columbia University: “Method of Science Film: Tsuchimoto Noriaki and some Notes on Film Techniques”
Respondent: Nate Shockey, Assistant Professor of Japanese, Bard College
5:00 pm – 7:00 pm – Dinner Break
Evening Screening: 7:30 pm – 10:30 pm
Treasures from Asian Film Archives – China
Traditional Chinese prelude music
Introduction: Li DaoXin, Professor, School of Arts, Peking University
Translation: Wentao Ma, Columbia University
Under the Heel (Dir & sc: Wang Yuanlong, Da Zhonghua-Baihe Film Co., 1929) rt. 60 min.
Silent piano accompaniment: Makia Matsumura
Legacies of Leftism Conference, Day 1
8:30 am – Registration – Lenfest Lobby
9:00 am – Welcome – Sarah Cole, Professor of English and Comparative Literature, Dean of Humanities, Columbia University
Panel 1: 9:15 am – 10:30 am
China and Leftist Theory: Then and Now
Chair: Lydia Liu Director, Institute for Comparative Literature and Society
Wun Tsun Tam, Professor in the Humanities, Columbia University
Yomi Braester, Professor of Comparative Literature, Cinema and Media, Univ. of Washington: “Leftism is an Issue of Traveling: On the Gaps between Theory, Criticism, and Activism”
Jason McGrath, Associate Professor of Asian Languages and Literatures, Univ. of Minnesota: “Prescriptive Realism: Theorizing Chinese Cinema from Communism to Capitalism”
Respondent: Laurence Coderre, Assistant Professor of East Asian Studies, New York University
Coffee Break - 10:30 am – 10:55 am – The Lantern – 8th floor
Panel 2: 11:00 am – 12:15 pm
Feminist Theory & Critical Theory in Korea
Chair: Stephen Chung, Associate Professor of East Asian Studies, Princeton University
Jaeho Kang, Associate Professor of Communication, Seoul National University: “Beyond Left-Wing Melancholy: Legacies of Critical Theory in Media Studies in South Korea”
Soyoung Kim, Professor of Cinema Studies, Korea National University of Arts: “Inside/Outside (內外): Postcolonial Women’s Sphere of Media and Maechae (媒體)”
Respondent: Rob King, Associate Professor of Film, Columbia University
12: 15 pm – 1:30 pm - Lunch Break
Panel 3: 1:30 pm – 3:15 pm
Praxis
Chair: Tomi Suzuki, Professor of Japanese Literature, Columbia University
Anastasia Fedorova, Associate Professor of Institute for Oriental and Classical Studies, Moscow Higher School of Economics: “Echoes of ‘Socialist Realism’ in Japanese Film Theory and Practice”
Diane Wei Lewis, Assistant Professor of Film & Media Studies, Washington University-St. Louis: "Prokino's Praxis: The Theory behind Mobile Film Units and Mobilization Networks during Its Bolshevization Period (1930-1932)"
Jane Gaines, Professor of Film, Columbia University: “The 1930s Workers International Photo Leagues and the Comintern”
Respondent: Tatiana Linkhoeva, Assistant Professor of Japanese, New York University
Coffee Break: 3:15 – 3:40 pm - Lenfest – The Lantern - 8th floor
Panel 4: 3:45 pm– 5:30 pm
Theories of Subjectivity, Coordination & Movement
Chair: Wei Shang, Du Family Professor of Chinese Culture, EALAC, Columbia University
Ying Qian, Assistant Professor of Chinese Cinema and Media, EALAC, Columbia University: “Creative Labor in an Age of Mechanical Reproduction and Colonial War: Zheng Junli's Theory of Acting beyond Stanislavski in China”
Weihong Bao, Associate Professor of Film and Media, East Asian Languages and Cultures, University of California, Berkeley: “The Art of Coordination: Design Thinking and Media Politics in Wartime China.”
Laikwan Pang, Professor, Chinese University of Hong Kong: “Maoism and Development: China’s Great Leap Forward versus India’s Naxalite Movement”
Respondent: Debashree Mukherjee, Assistant Professor of Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies, Columbia University
5:45 pm – 7:15 pm Dinner Break
Evening Screening: 7:30 pm – 10:30 pm
Treasures from the Archives – Japan and the U.S. (Ikira Iwasaki, Japan, 1945)
Introduction: Carol Gluck, George Sansom Professor of History; Chair, Committee on Global Thought, Columbia University: “Akira Iwasaki and Erik Barnouw: Prokino and Columbia University”
Markus Nornes, Professor of Asian Cinema, University of Michigan
Richard Axel and Sarah Sze: Neuroscience, Art and the Construction of Reality
Richard Axel, Neuroscience, and Sarah Sze, Visual Arts / Alan Kanzer Artist-in-Residence at the Zuckerman Institute, discussed the construction of reality in the first of a new series of conversations between artists and neuroscientists on the Manhattanville campus.
Complex Issues: A Strange New Beauty
Screening followed by a conversation between Writer, Director, and Editor Shelly Silver, Visual Arts, and Kadambari Baxi, Barnard College.
Directing Thesis: The Woman / The Man: An Evening of Two One-Act Plays
Columbia University School of the Arts is proud to present Jeffrey Page’s '19 production of The Woman / The Man.
The Woman / The Man is a theatrical double feature comprised of two Obie-winning plays: Adrienne Kennedy’s Funnyhouse of a Negro and Suzan-Lori Parks’ The Death of the Last Black Man in the Whole Entire World AKA the Negro Book of the Dead.
What They Had
Blythe Danner (left) stars as “Ruth” and Hilary Swank (right) stars as “Bridget” in Elizabeth Chomko’s What They Had, a Bleecker Street release. Credit: Bleecker Street
Blythe Danner, Robert Forster, Michael Shannon, and Hilary Swank star in a “new landmark Alzheimer's film [that] is heartbreaking, inspiring, funny and true,” according to AARP. What They Had “pulls back the lens from the patient—the subject of most Alzheimer’s films—to focus on caregivers.” Screening followed by a conversation with Writer and Director Elizabeth Chomko, Producer Albert Berger ’83, and Hilary Brougher, Film.
After her ailing mother wanders off during a blizzard, Bridget returns to her childhood home in Chicago, accompanied by her rebellious college-age daughter. Forced to referee between her father’s stubborn insistence that his wife remain at home and her equally determined brother’s efforts to place her in a sought-after “memory care” facility, Bridget struggles to make sense of a lifetime of family conflict. With her mother’s decline becoming increasingly obvious, long-simmering resentments make an already difficult decision close to impossible. What They Had is an intimate and tender story of a challenge faced by many families.
Co-presented by Columbia Narrative Medicine, Columbia School of Social Work, and Mailman School of Public Health.
“Blythe Danner and Hilary Swank Soar in Caregiving Movie ‘What They Had,’” AARP, October/November 2018.
Check-in will begin one hour prior to start time. Seating is limited and first come, first served. Advance registration does not guarantee seating; early arrival is suggested.
Zoom-In
What happens when we combine films we had never previously thought to combine? Is there something to be gained from unusual unions? Zoom-In is a screening series curated by Columbia University's Film and Media Studies MA class of 2019 that asks these very questions and more.
Directing Thesis: Medea
Told in present-day times with an international cast representing over nine countries, this highly physicalized staging of Euripides' Medea explores gender roles, citizenship, and justice in a divided world.