Loretta Fahrenholz

In her greatly differing films, Loretta Fahrenholz creates intentional ambiguity in relation to levels of reality. This points up her relativist way of handling the coherence of documentary processes which she consciously transgresses using staged elements. Role games and improvisation take on a special significance here. “People don’t know how to act. Just lie down. Lie down and quit acting like you know,” says someone in Ditch Plains, Loretta Fahrenholz’s film set in a New York still suffering from the effects of hurricane Sandy. In this nocturnal and gloomy last-days-scenario people lie motionless on the streets – until they are wondrously infused with movement. The New York dance group, Ringmasters Crew, play here with elements from popular culture – zombie films and computer games – thus forming a counterpoint and simultaneously enlivening the devastated setting. Along with a further film of hers, Loretta Fahrenholz will be presenting Leslie Thornton, a filmmaker whose experimental praxis and playful engagement with genre conventions have a close affinity to her own work.

Film Program

Leslie Thornton, Peggy and Fred in Hell: The Prologue, 1985, 20 min

Loretta Fahrenholz, My Throat, My Air, 2013, 17 min

Loretta Fahrenholz, Ditch Plains, 2013, 30 min

Presented by Loretta Fahrenholz

Loretta Fahrenholz lives in Berlin and New York. Films (selection): My Throat, My Air (2013); Ditch Plains (2013); Grand Openings Return of the Blogs (2012); Haust (2010); Que Bárbara (2011); Implosion (2011).