This Week’s Must-See Art Events: Midsummer Night Screenings

El (1954) is a lesser known Buñuel flick that tells the story of a husband who becomes consumed by his fear that other men are going to steal his wife from him. Ah, a typical cuckolding film as old as, well, probably The Odyssey. The film was apparently so accurate in its portrayal that Jacques Lacan showed the movie to his students as a case study in paranoia.

From the press release: “‘Miseria’ stars a time traveling bolero singing hermaphroditic life form from NYC, circa 1970!” Sounds like David Bowie’s The Man Who Fell to Earth mixed with…okay, we don’t know what it sounds like exactly. We’re intrigued, and that’s reason enough to go.

The trailer for Stanya Kahn’s It’s Cool, I’m Good (2010) shows a bandaged and crutched Kahn stumbling throughout Los Angeles and making quips like “Do I look like the Invisible Man? That’s not supposed to be a trick question.” That, as well as Kahn’s videos Arms Are Overrated (2012) and For the Birds (2013) will be screening at Electronic Arts Intermix, with an artist talk afterwards hosted by one of our century’s biggest film experts, Ed Halter. Known for their humor as much as their poignant cultural critiques, Kahn’s videos are perfect for some video art that can both make you laugh and think.

Kenneth Anger’s Invocation of My Demon Brother (1969) is a classic of underground cinema, full of quasi-satanic rituals and the strangest soundtrack Mick Jagger ever made. As much as Anger was a provocateur, he was a talented cinematographer. This screening (on a 16mm film print) is a chance to see his film in all its visual glory—something you just won’t get from YouTube. The screening is paired with Ivan Zulueta’s Arrebato (1980), which is apparently a cult legend in Spain. Summaries of the film’s plot are vague, but according to Dirty Looks NYC’s press release it tells the story of a horror director who’s “consumed by the vampiric apparatus of cinema.” Sounds like it should go well with Anger.

Two weeks ago we gave you a preview of Vice’s 13th annual photography issue—hopefully you’ve gone out and picked up a free copy since then. Now, you can get the full experience by seeing the show in a gallery instead of on a newsstand: Matthew Leifheit (formerly of AFC) curated this superb collection of photos from both established and up-and-coming artists, all dealing with the theme trompe l’oeil. You should check this out, if not for the Cindy Sherman pictures, then at least for the Freddy Kruger nativity scene and those ham vaginas we left out of the preview.

In 1987, political artist extraordinaire Alfredo Jaar used the imposing screens of Times Square to show a single image: an outline of United States with the words “This is Not America” emblazoned over it. His message was simple: America includes all countries in the north and south continents, not just the USA. Now, every night in August, you can see the same images from 1987 projected onto the colossal Times Square screens, which have gotten much more ostentatious over the past few decades. However, we’ve already expressed our reservations about the efficacy of this work.

We love Flux, so we actually want to recommend this event to you a billion times. That would be annoying to our readers, so instead, just take our advice and head on out to Flux’s 20th birthday party and exhibition. For their twentieth anniversary, the people at Flux have excavated their building in search of dusty art—and not so dusty art—from the past two decades, put it in a show with work from up and coming artists, and are showing it this Friday. Come along and see the New York institution turned inside out. The exhibition opens on August 1 and the birthday party/banquet will be held on Saturday. Tickets for the birthday party will be $50—or you can just pay $15 for late-night rooftop dancing. Whee!

Here’s why you should go, in Flux’s own words:
“After two evictions, a move to Queens, hundreds of residents, a long overdue no-pet-policy, one shipwreck, two shantytowns, decades of beauty, wonderment, making the impossible happen, and only one stabbing, Flux is turning 20 and we want you to celebrate with us.”

Work by artists and Fluxers Alex Wolkowicz, Angela Washko, Annie Reichert, Ayden Grout, Ben Seretan, Caitlin Foley, Daupo, Douglas Paulson, Ellen Kleckner, Jacobus Capone, Jaime Iglehart, John Roach, Jonah Levy, Julius Schmiedel & Nick Normal, Lena Hawkins, Misha Rabinovich, Nick Cregor, SP Weather Station, Stephanie Avery, and Wieteke Heldens.
Curated by Jean Barberis, Aliya Bonar, Jason “Phunquey” Brown, Jason Eppink, Shona Masarin, Georgia Muenster, Douglas Paulson, Sam Perry, Nat Roe, Christina Vassallo

Cloaque is a self-defined digital landfill, where the Internet’s multitude of celestial GIFs get reconstructed into what looks like a mutant-made exquisite corpse. It mostly exists as a Tumblr, but this Saturday, curators Claudia Maté and Carlos Sáez have asked several artists to create 40-second-long videos, joined together in the same format as the Cloaque Tumblr. The results might look something like this.

Presenting artists include Jeremy Coullard, Brenna Murphy, Nicolas Sassoon, Sara Ludy, Jakko Pallasvuo, Carlos Sáez, and Golgotha. Music by Oliver Dias.

Tamara Johnson has created a non-functional backyard pool for LIC. If you dive in, you’ll get a huge, grass-covered bump on your head. That’s pretty accurate to what most New Yorkers get—no backyard swimming holes—but Tamara Johnson’s from Texas where everyone seems to have their own above-ground pool. This is her version of what happens when you try to blend Texas and New York summer lifestyles.

Sundance describes Trent Harris’s films as “Nancy Drew on acid.”That should give an incentive to see his newest film, Luna Mesa: In it, a photographer travels around the world deciphering a notebook filled with random symbols to try and uncover her boyfriend’s murderer. Expect an aimless, wandering narrative, a bit of absurd humor, and low-fi sci-fi.