Body of Truth (2019)
DOCUMENTARY | ART-IVISM | GENDER
FRIDAY 30 APRIL | 6:30PM
ACMI CINEMA 1
FEATURING A PRE-FILM ARTIST PERFORMANCE BY GEORGIA BANKS
AND A POST-FILM PANEL DISCUSSSION
Content warning: This film and performance contain nudity and the use of an artificial gun, as well as scenes or themes of self harm that some audience members may find disturbing. Viewer discretion is advised.
Australian Premiere
Director: Evelyn Schels
Country: Germany
Year: 2019
Duration: 95 minutes
Language: English and German with English subtitles
Genre: Documentary
Screening Location: ACMI Cinema 1, Federation Square, Melbourne | Plan your visit to ACMI **Please enter through the Fed Square entrance
Festival Selection
Synopsis
“The mind can lie, the mind can mostly lie, but the body never can lie.” - Marina Abramović
Artists Marina Abramović, Sigalit Landau, Shirin Neshat & Katharina Sieverding have been politicized by experiences with war, violence and suppression and integrated them into their work, using the most personal feature available: their own bodies.
In Body of Truth we accompany these artists on an emotional journey through their biographies. They stand for the major conflicts of our time: Iranian exile Shirin Neshat examines the discrepancies within Islamic society; Marina Abramović, the daughter of Montenegrin partisans, has repeatedly explored the issues of violence, pain and grief, as experienced indirectly in the Yugoslav wars; the German Katharina Sieverding examines the problem of fascist structures, from the Nazi era to Pegida and Israeli artist Sigalit Landau’s work draws on the quotidian fear of terror. Each act creates a vital way to address the violence of the past and, in doing so, also the present. Evelyn Schels's documentary presents these artists and their differing works to us, then steps back so we can draw our own conclusions.
Unclassified 15+
PRE-FILM PERFORMANCE BY GEORGIA BANKS
Georgia Banks’ works begin with an invitation and a provocation. Sometimes they are met with an overwhelming response, sometimes no one answers at all. They do not value either of these outcomes over the other. In recent years they have been banned from Tinder, sued by the estate of Hannah Wilke, and awarded Miss Social Impact in a national beauty pageant. They would like to go viral, become a reality TV star, and be inaugurated into the Guinness World Records Hall of Fame.
Georgia Banks is a current studio artist at Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne.
They completed a Masters of Fine Arts (Research) at the Victoria College of the Arts in 2015.
@georgiaraebanks
She / They
PANEL DISCUSSION
Caro Llewellyn
Caro Llewellyn is the CEO of the Wheeler Centre for Books, Writing and Ideas and author of the 2020 Stella Prize shortlisted memoir, Diving into Glass. The former artistic director of a number of high-profile literary Festivals including Sydney Writers’ Festival and Festival des Écrivains du Monde in Paris, she also directed the World Voices Festival in New York City for Salman Rushdie and the human rights organisation, PEN.
Photo credit: Beowulf Sheehan
Elle Rusch Drakos
An award-winning conceptual and ideas-driven Artistr, Contemporary Art Curator and Art Consultant with an international background and a wide range of visual and strategic strengths in the creative industries. Career highlights include working as a Creative Director and Art Consultant for the Olympic Games and high-profile brands such as Samsung, Vodafone, Sky Television and UEFA. I have also had the opportunity to work in the Middle East as an Art Consultant for the Royal Family of the United Arab Emirates. My role as the owner and Creative Director of RED Gallery, one of Melbourne’s most iconic gallery spaces, has given me the opportunity to be an active forerunner in the Melbourne contemporary art scene with a passion for supporting emerging, established and mid-range female artists from multi-modal backgrounds. Passionate about the arts, cultural management and creative mentorship I am an accomplished workshop facilitator, writer and public speaker for the creative arts, trend forecasting and futurism as well as a champion for general artistic wellbeing, youth mentorship, women in the arts and the therapeutic attributes of the arts
Insta: @red.gallery
Facebook: @RedGalleryAU
Hannah Fox
Hannah Fox is an artist, curator and festival director with a focus on sound art, large-scale public art, contemporary music and live art.
Her work has crossed a broad spectrum of outcomes, from devising and delivering a performance intervention for the Tate Modern to creating a stage show for Janes Addiction and choreographing cranes and forklifts for a large-scale car stunt show.
Since returning to Australia in 2007, she founded creative partnership Supple Fox; delivered four years of contemporary music programs as Artistic Associate at Melbourne Festival and then made the move to Mona at the very beginning stages of their winter festival, Dark Mofo where she became Associate Creative Director.
In the last few years, Supple Fox ventured into developing their own artistic practice in collaboration with artist Byron J Scullin. In June 2m7, the group presented a new work, Siren Song, a large-scale, outdoor sonic artwork that fills the skies of a city, which continues to be remounted in cities around the world.
Hannah has recently joined forces with artist Gideon Obarzanek as Co-Artistic Directors of RISING.
GEORGIA BANKS
Georgia Banks’ works begin with an invitation and a provocation. Sometimes they are met with an overwhelming response, sometimes no one answers at all. They do not value either of these outcomes over the other. In recent years they have been banned from Tinder, sued by the estate of Hannah Wilke, and awarded Miss Social Impact in a national beauty pageant. They would like to go viral, become a reality TV star, and be inaugurated into the Guinness World Records Hall of Fame. They have never had a filling nor broken a bone (although they have been crucified) and once was convinced they had accidentally sliced away a part of their labia during a performance (they hadn’t).
Georgia Banks is a current studio artist at Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne.
They completed a Masters of Fine Arts (Research) at the Victoria College of the Arts in 2015.
@georgiaraebanks
She / They
JEssie Alice (Moderator)
Jessie Alice is an artist, writer and curator with a passion for place-making and repurposing. Jessie has led a broad range of creative collaborations locally and internationally, with organisations such as Food Art Week, This Art Fair, FedSquare, and Lentil as Anything. Jessie is also the founder of Leftover Food Lovers, addressing food waste in a poetic way using edible foraged foods and produce that would otherwise have gone to waste.
Community Impact Partner
The Women’s Art Register is Australia’s living archive of women’s art practice (cis, non-binary and trans inclusive) and an artist-run community and resource.
Since 1975 W.A.R. has provided a platform for research, education, advocacy and support to enhance the status of women artists and address issues of professional practice, equity and cultural heritage.