SEXUALITY MALFUNCTIONED

Still from “The Color of Love” by Peggy Ahwesh

Still from “Martina’s Playhouse” by Peggy Ahwesh.

Still from “Family Tyranny” by Paul McCarthy with Mike Kelley.

Sexuality Malfunctioned

Curated by Astria Suparak
For Pratt Film Series
@ Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, NY
November 10, 1999. Tour through 2000.

(Performance) Anxiety, ambivalence, anticipation. Some works use found footage and pornography.

PROGRAM

Family Tyranny (Modeling and Molding), Paul McCarthy & Mike Kelley, 1987, video, 15:03 min.

The Color of Love, Peggy Ahwesh, 1994, 16mm, 10 min.

Sodom, Luther Price, 1989, Super-8mm, 20 min.

Performance, Laura Parnes, 1995, video, 4 min.

Talent Show, Laura Parnes, 1996, video, 4 min.

Lullaby, Jennifer Reeder, 1999, video, 18 min.

No Place Like Home #1, Karen Yasinsky, 1999, film on video, 5 min.
Drop That Baby Again, Karen Yasinsky, 1999, film on video, 6 min.

Previous versions of this program included:

WSNO, Miranda July, 1998, audio with gel over projector, 9:12 min.

No Place Like Home #2, Karen Yasinsky, 1999, video, 6 min.

Johnny Take a Dive, Jennifer Reeder, 1999, video, 14 min.

Martina’s Playhouse, Peggy Ahwesh, 1989, Super8 film on video, 20 min.

The Color of Love, Peggy Ahwesh, 1994, 16mm, 10 min.

PRESS

WISCONSIN IN STEP:

Excerpt:
Curated by Astria Suparak, Film Series Director at Pratt Institute, Sexuality Malfunctioned’s entire program runs less than 90 minutes but will nevertheless prove daunting to the [Hollywood]-minded masses. Nothing fits easily in these short films and videos (and one audio-piece) – either the soundtrack sits uncomfortably on top of the image like a Coke can floating in a pond or a variety of devices are used to obscure the image or both. This is doubly disorienting because much of the imagery is pornographic and violent (often simultaneously) and the tweaking offers little moral edification.

Still, because Suparak has programmed Sexuality Malfunctioned like a perfectly coherent essay, one need only keep in mind her précis from the program notes to begin to see how these bursts of mismatching energy actually signify…
– Kevin John