And the Jurors are...
The Ann Arbor Film Festival is pleased to announce the selection of three esteemed jurors for the 59th Ann Arbor Film Festival, scheduled to take place online for the second year in a row on March 23–28, 2021. The jurors are Thorsten Fleisch, Lynn Loo, and Sheri Wills. The three will virtually attend the six-day festival, viewing 116 films in competition and awarding over $23,000 in cash and in-kind awards. In addition, each juror will present a specially curated program of work during the festival.
Thorsten Fleisch Juror Presentation: Sensual Destruction: Disintegrating the Frantic Silence of the Universe
3/26 Friday at 1:30pm
Thorsten Fleisch is a German filmmaker and artist. He made his first film experiments with his dad’s Super 8 camera when still in school. He studied experimental film with Professor Peter Kubelka at the Städelschule in Frankfurt and works with digital and analog film. With materials such as the body, crystals, fire, and electricity, he worked directly on 16 mm film strips. Crystals are grown on the film and 30,000 volts burn through photo paper. The results are poetic and abstract visual systems with references to catharsis, the cosmos, and the universe. In 2003 Fleisch received an Honorary Mention at Prix Ars Electronica in Linz (Austria) for his computer-animated film Gestalt. High voltage is the center of his work Energie! for which he has won international acclaim. He created commissioned work for Gaspar Noé, Red Bull, and Basement Jaxx among others. His films received several awards and were shown at festivals worldwide like New York Film Festival, Ars Electronica, Transmediale, Ottawa International Animation Festival, Clermont-Ferrand Short Film Festival, International Film Festival Rotterdam, Annecy International Animation Film Festival, San Francisco International Film Festival, and many more. He lives and works in Berlin.
Lynn Loo Juror Presentation: Conversations, Light, Color, Movement
3/25 Thursday at 1:30pm
Lynn Loo is a film conservationist and composes films in structural and narrative forms. Her work explores the raw and tactile aspects of moving images and sound, both in 16mm and digital formats. In 2004, in collaboration with Guy Sherwin, she began creating film performance works and touring with their programs to international venues including Punto de Vista International Documentary Film Festival of Navarra; Performa 13 Biennale, New York; and L’Âge d’Or in Brussels. She curates programs of artist films, most recently for Yebisu International Festival for Art & Alternative Visions, Tokyo. Loo is currently working with artist and archivist Louise Curham on the preservation of film performances.
Sheri Wills Juror Presentation: What Does Light Remember?
3/24 Wednesday at 1:30pm
Sheri Wills is an artist whose work is based in film, video performance, and installation. Her work has been exhibited internationally, including one-person shows at the Director’s Lounge in Berlin, the Robert Beck Memorial Cinema in NYC, and The International Experimental Cinema Exposition. Her films have been screened at venues such as the London Film Festival, the Alchemy Film, and Moving Image Festival, the Ann Arbor Film Festival, the International Film Festival in Rotterdam, Experiments in Cinema, and the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Her collaborations include live video projects with music composed by Jan Jirásek, Charles Norman Mason, Bright Sheng, and Ofer Ben-Amots and video performances with music ensembles, including the NYC choral group, Khorikos, the Providence String Quartet, Luna Nova New Music Ensemble, and Ensemble QAT in Montreal, at venues including Roulette in Brooklyn, the Firehouse Space in Brooklyn, and the Czech Center in NYC. Sheri's film-based installations have been exhibited in galleries and museums, including the Islip Art Museum, Hobusepea gallery in Tallinn, Estonia, and At Home Gallery in Šamorín, Slovakia. She is a Professor in the Department of Film/Animation/Video at the Rhode Island School of Design and resides in New York City.
Passes for the 59th AAFF are now on sale and include access to all the festival’s programming including 116 films in competition, juror programs, special programs, salons, expanded cinema performances as well as Q&As with the filmmakers. Learn more about festival passes here. Tickets for each event will be available as a sliding scale with a suggested price of $12 and a minimum of $2 per ticket (The $2 minimum covers platform fees). The tickets and festival schedule will be available on March 1.
