Ad Hoc Cinema in association with Coral Gables Art Cinema presents Terra Femme (2021) a live film lecture-performance by Courtney Stephens with music by Sarah Davachi.
A film essay comprising women's amateur travelogues from the 1920s-50s; an inquiry into early non-fiction Cinema. Comprised of rare amateur travelogues shot by women between the 1920s-50s, Terra Femme is a live documentary presented as a live lecture-performance, similar to the way these films might have been exhibited nearly a hundred years ago when they were shot. Courtney Stephens weaves together, alongside a sobering score by composer Sarah Davachi, questions of female authorship, cinematic excavation, and the Western gaze...complicating the freedoms these women experienced while traveling through foreign landscapes. The films present a new type of traveler: no longer a male seeker of conquests, she might be a divorcee on a tour of biblical gardens, or a widow on a cruise to the North Pole. Representing the world through women’s eyes, the films raise questions about female representation in the archive and the role amateur movie-making plays in understanding the participation of women in early non-fiction filmmaking. Moving between geographical essay, personal inquiry, and historical speculation, examining these films as both private documents and accidental ethnographies.
Tickets: $19 (General Admission)
About Courtney Stephens
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Courtney Stephens is a writer/director of non-fiction and experimental films. The American Sector, her documentary (co-directed with Pacho Velez) about fragments of the Berlin Wall transplanted to the U.S., was named one of the best films of 2021 in The New Yorker. Her essay film, Terra Femme, comprised of amateur travel footage shot by women in the early 20th century, premiered at MoMA and has toured widely as a live performance. Her work has been exhibited at The National Gallery of Art, The Barbican, Walker Art Center, The Royal Geographical Society, BAMPFA, Garage Museum, and in film festivals including the Berlinale, Hong Kong International Film Festival, South by Southwest, and the New York Film Festival. Stephens is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship and a Fulbright Scholarship to India.