Various directors | 1991 | 60’ | EN subs

Excellent Suits is a guest program by Steffanie Ling (Artistic Director of Images Festival, Toronto, CA). The title of this program is pulled from Lorna Boschman’s interview with video artist Maureen Bradley in her documentary Boy Girl (1999) which offers three perspectives on androgynous life. In the film, Bradley spoke about her fluctuating fashion sense in her youth when she performed in a band as a mod femme and excavate thrift stores and “get these really excellent suits.” In selecting the works in this program, Ling considered the euphemism for a naked body, a birthday suit, and works that present ways that such a suit can be touched, refuted, and tailored — to be in one’s most excellent suit.

BOY GIRL
Lorna Boschman | 1999 | Canada | 14’ | digital

Three people discussing their gender identity and ambiguity: one who alternated gender costumes while performing in a rock band, another who is often publicly challenged because she looks masculine and a third who modeled based on her androgynous appearance. Featuring interviews with Maureen Bradley, Sheila Gilhooly and Andrea Fatona.

GRAVITY
Wrik Mead | 1987 | Canada | 3’ | 16mm

When you wake up and you have so much to do that you just want to go back to bed. The illusion created by shooting the entire film in reverse emphasizes the entire cycle of life.

CRAMPS
Daniel Cardinal McCartney | 2019 | Canada | 4’ | DCP

The third work in “Mothering Myself” — a series of nine performances for video.

THE KISS
Eva Stefani | 2007 | Greece | 4’ | DCP

Two women kiss to sounds of a song by Poly Panou.

ACROPOLIS
Eva Stefani | 2001 | Greece | 26’ | DCP

The film explores the significance of Greece’s national symbol, the Acropolis, in the creation of national identity and collective memory. Likening the “sacred rock” to the female body, the film attempts to make a comment on the timeless exploitation of the monument, while exploring the relation of History to pornography. —Thessaloniki Film Festival

ITINERARY OF SURFACES
Carl Elsaesser | 2020 | USA | 8’ | DCP

What I am//What you are//salt and sweat on my tongue. A love letter of domestic imagination. The habits and musings of the ordinary in a remote location. A year of rain and other fluids. Contentment is a difficult emotion. —Carl Elsaesser