Weather, or Not
2/3/02026 The Union Cinema, Milwaukee
The weather moves around as the
clouds imagine their own nephology:
wondering what these people see
when they see what they see.
Fluttering by, attention pulls focus from
the movement of the cloud, to
the movement of the wind, to
the movement of the eye, to
the movement of the mind,
without ever moving an inch. All the
while, we’re watching seeing, or
observing looking, or something like
that. A program of short works that
explore place, space and the weather
(or not), in all its sublime, mundane and
chaotic glory.
Salise Hughes - How to Draw Clouds 2006, 2:20, color, sound, video on DCP
“A meditation on the desire to hold on to the ephemeral.” -SH
Peter Hutton - Landscape (for Manon) 1986-87, 18 mins., B&W, silent, 24fps, 16mm “First section of an extended study of the weather and landscape in the Hudson River Valley.” -PH
Jeanne Liotta - Observando El Cielo 2007, 19 mins., color, sound, 16mm
“Seven years of celestial field recordings gathered from the chaos of the cosmos and inscribed onto 16mm film from various locations upon this turning tripod Earth. This work is neither a metaphor nor a symbol, but is feeling towards a fact in the midst of perception, which time flows through. Natural VLF radio recordings of the magnetosphere in action allow the universe to speak for itself.” -JL
Chris Welsby - Tree
1974, 5 mins., color, silent, 24fps, 16mm
“The camera was placed on the flexible branch of a tree in a strong wind. The composition included both stationary and moving trees (a wooded landscape). The relationship of this landscape to the vertical and horizontal plane was maintained as much as possible. The camera ran continuously until all the film was exposed. The world is seen from the point of view of a tree as its branches sway to the rhythm of the wind.” -CW
Annapurna Kumar - Mountain Castle Mountain Flower Plastic
2017, 3:08, sound, video on DCP
“Small pieces of information can be stored separately within a shared container. The most efficient containers can house multiple pieces of information in the same location, intersecting from different angles.” -AK
Janie Geiser - Ultima Thule
2002, 10 mins., color, sound, 16mm “Gravity fails, and land and sky lose their historical meaning. A small silver plane navigates an ultramarine storm, flying over barely-glimpsed hills, an unlikely ferry to ” ultima Thule”: the farthest point north, the limit of any journey. The seduction of immersion in blue is too strong to avoid, the land fills with water, and time loses its line.” -JG
Mike Gibisser - Blue Loop, July
2014, 5 mins., color, sound, 16mm on DCP “Chicago's summertime blazes, unanchored. Skywriting out of time.” -MG
Landscape (for Manon), Observando El Cielo, Tree and Ultima Thule are drawn from UWM’s Cinema Arts Archive (thank you to Kati Katchever for her stewardship); all other titles are courtesy of the artists themselves (thank you to each of them); special gratitude to the Union Cinema staff and the Programming Committee. (Organized by Jesse Malmed)
