Hemlock Forest (2016, 42m) + Wedding Loop (2017, 23m)
Steeped in personal and literary history, Moyra Davey’s videos explore compulsion, creativity, and the feminine. Hemlock Forest, a sequel to her 2011 work Les Goddesses, and Wedding Loop, employ the same rigorous formal strategy: Davey paces in front of the camera inside her apartment, reciting her narration from an iPhone, then incorporates old photographs or home movies to form a visual essay around the monologue. In the former, Davey traces the worlds of Karl Ove Knausgård and Chantal Akerman as she considers the implications of her son leaving home and Akerman’s suicide; the latter recounts a wedding party and the women involved, reflected through the work of 19th-century photographer Julia Margaret Cameron. An in-depth discussion, tracing many different facets of Davey’s decades-long career as an artist, will follow the screening.

This event also celebrates the release of the book Moyra Davey: Les Goddesses/Hemlock Forest from Dancing Foxes Press. Books will be available at the theater for sale, and Davey will be on hand for a signing after the discussion.