Chicago Filmmakers (map) | Friday May 2, 2025 | 7:00PM

Based in San Francisco, the avant-garde filmmaker Sandra Davis has spent the past 50 years constructing works of arresting beauty and elegant poeticism. Her approach to editing was inspired by Johann Sebastian Bach, taking influence from the harpsichord's short decay and the fugal form to ensure that her every successive image shapes one's understanding of all previous ones. This deep consideration of form, as well as her seamless blend of the cerebral and emotive, is something that Stan Brakhage has commented on regarding her 1980 masterpiece Maternal Filigree: "It trembles like poetry, music... symbol rubs and clashes with symbol, so that each is always vibrant."

There will be two programs for this event with a short intermission in between. The first program will focus on Davis' sound films, which includes her striking postcard trilogy, whose works were conceived as "songs to the passion of place." The second program will highlight Davis' silent works, including her 1988 film, An Architecture of Desire, which melds images of the Chaco Canyon, Chicago's Graceland Cemetery, and her elderly aunt's body. All films will be shown on 16mm with prints courtesy of Canyon Cinema. The US premiere of Davis' films took place in 1978 at Chicago Filmmakers, and we are excited to bring her works back decades later. Sandra Davis will be in attendance for a rare post-screening Q&A.

Presented in collaboration with Tone Glow.

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Chicago Filmmakers does not deny admission to those who do not have the ability to make a donation. Please email coop@chicagofilmmakers.org to inquire about free admission.