Introduced by Chema González, Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía

Kidlat Tahimik. Balikbayan #1. Memorias del superdesarrollo redux IV. Film, 2021.

Monday, November 8, 2021, 12:00 p.m. EST
This event was ONLINE and in ENGLISH with SPANISH CAPTIONS

This program is part of the series of activities organized in conjunction with the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía: Magellan, Marilyn, Mickey & Fr. Dámaso. 500 Years of Conquistador RockStars by Kidlat Tahimik
October 28, 2021- March 6, 2022/Retiro Park, Palacio de Cristal, Madrid

The director, actor, performer, and artist Kidlat Tahimik, which means “Silent Lightning” in Tagalog, is a key figure of the so-called ‘slow cinema’ movement, as well as an undisputed pioneer of Filipino independent film. Tahimik’s self-reflexive, and often satirical filmography and intermedia artistic practice takes the form of an improvisational back and forth, whereby artworks reference the storytelling in his films and the latter become open narratives under constant revision. Tahimik’s installations and films present us with a critical entanglement between the personal, Filipino traditions and knowledges, and the country’s violent colonial legacies. Something Tahimik himself has described as cinema’s ‘third way,’ a critical standpoint against capitalism’s investment in the individual in favor a collective and shared struggle of the colonized. Tahimik has been honored with numerous awards at international film festivals, most notably the International Critics’ Prize at Berlinale (1977) and, more recently, the Prince Claus Laureate Award (2018). At the 2019 Sharjah Biennial he presented Ang Ma-bagyong Sabungan ng 2 Bathala ng Hangin, A Stormy Clash Between 2 Goddesses of the Winds (WW III – the Protracted Kultur War) to great critical acclaim. Among others, his filmography includes Perfumed Nightmare (1977), Turumba (1983), and BalikBayan #1: Memories of Overdevelopment (Redux III, 2015; Redux VI, 2017).

Sara Nadal-Melsió is a NYC-based Catalan writer, curator, and teacher. She has taught at the University of Pennsylvania, Princeton University, SOMA in Mexico City, and is presently teaching at New York University. She is the co-author of Alrededor de/ Around, and the editor of two special issues on cinema, The Invisible Tradition: Avant-Garde Catalan Cinema under Late Francoism and The Militant Image: Temporal Disturbances of the Political Imagination. She has also cocurated a show on Allora & Calzadilla for the Fundació Tápies in Barcelona and has written a book essay about it, as well as edited a companion volume on the Puerto Rican crisis.

Programmed in conjunction with Sulo: The Philippine Studies Initiative at NYU and the Visions/Panawin Film Series, which features Kidlat Tahimik’s Perfumed Nightmare / Mababangong Bangungot (1978, 1h 33min), Oct 16 – Oct 30. This screening is limited to NYU affiliates and restricted to the NYC Tri-State area. For more information: https://wp.nyu.edu/spsi/film-series/film-series-fall-2021/

Co-sponsored by Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía (MNCARS). With the collaboration of the Agencia Española de Cooperación Internacional y Desarrollo (AECID).