April 8–15: Screening of Bruce Conner’s EASTER MORNING by SFMOMA
Bruce Conner, EASTER MORNING, 2008, 8mm film transferred to video, color, with sound, 10 min.; music: “In C” (1964), composed by Terry Riley, performed by the Shanghai Film Orchestra. © Conner Family Trust; image: courtesy Conner Family Trust.
The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) is screening Bruce Conner’s 2008 film EASTER MORNING from April 8 through April 15 as a part of its #MuseumFromHome initiative—which offers viewers at home a rotating selection of films and videos from the SFMOMA Media Arts collection.
Departing from an inimitable film repertoire of tour-de-force editing technique, visual comedy, and apocalyptic themes, avant-garde master Bruce Conner envisioned EASTER MORNING (2008)—a metaphysical quest for renewal beyond the natural and ephemeral worlds—to be his last finished masterpiece.
Keeping with his ritualistic reworking and re-imagining of his films, the image source originates from [his] 8mm Kodachrome footage of EASTER MORNING RAGA (1966), expanded in duration, gauge, and frame rate to devise an effect of visual transcendence. EASTER MORNING celebrates Conner’s reverence for experiential cinema, aleatoric sound, and discoveries within the realm of the spirit. — Michelle Silva, Conner Family Trust