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Past Film/Video | Documentaries | Series & Festivals
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STREAMS ON THIS PAGE Pay what you can We’re offering a sliding scale for our Unorthodocs Shorts screenings in an effort to keep our programming accessible to all people, especially in a moment of extreme financial uncertainty. Please consider your needs and abilities—as well as those of others—when choosing how much to pay for this screening. We are very grateful for the generous support of patrons with the means to chip in a bit more in these precarious times.
We strive to host inclusive, accessible events that enable all individuals, including individuals with disabilities, to engage fully. If you have questions about accessibility or require an accommodation such as captioning or ASL interpretation to participate in this event, please contact Accessibility Manager Helyn Marshall at accessibility@wexarts.org or via telephone at (614) 688-3890. Requests made by two weeks in advance will generally allow us to provide seamless access, but the Wexner Center for the Arts will make every effort to meet requests made after this date.
Unorthodocs, our popular crash course in creative nonfiction filmmaking, returns with this showcase of acclaimed short documentaries.
This selection of shorts features films from up-and-coming filmmakers and established artists working in a dizzying range of forms and tones. Themes of community, isolation, memory, absence, presence, and witnessing create a through line among these remarkable films. (85 mins., digital video)
Program lineup
Cardinal © Kevin Jerome Everson, image courtesy of the artist; Trilobite-Arts DAC; Picture Palace Pictures
Cardinal (Kevin Jerome Everson, 2019)
Mansfield, Ohio, native and past Wexner Center Artist Residency Award recipient Kevin Jerome Everson films birdwatchers looking for the state bird of Ohio. (2:30 mins., digital video). Please note that this film is silent.
Hunstville Station, image courtesy of the artist
Huntsville Station (Jamie Meltzer and Chris Filippone, 2020)
Every weekday, inmates are released from the Texas State Penitentiary in Huntsville, taking in their first moments of freedom with phone calls, cigarettes, and quiet reflection at the Greyhound station up the block. (14 mins., digital video)
Spit on the Broom, image courtesy of the artist
Spit on the Broom (Madeleine Hunt Ehrlich, 2019)
This surrealist documentary explores the African American women’s group the United Order of Tents, a clandestine organization formed in the 1840s during the height of the Underground Railroad. The film uses excerpts from the public record, over a century's worth of newspaper articles, and a visual tapestry of fable and myth as a way to introduce a secret history. (12 mins., digital video)
Practice, image courtesy of the artist
Practice (Iyabo Kwayana, 2018)
Filmed near the Shaolin temple in Henan, China, Practice moves from the mundane realm of repetitious rehearsal to fantastic fulfillment. Told nonverbally and without a main character, the film is an immersive guided meditation into a simple moment in time, conveying the diverse experiences of a group of students engaged in a collective process. (10 mins., digital video)
(((((/*\))))) (Echoes of the Volcano), image courtesy of the artist
(((((/*\))))) (Echoes of the Volcano) (Charles Fairbanks and Saúl Kak, 2019)
Charles Fairbanks (a former Antioch media arts professor) and Saúl Kak (a Zoque artist and activist) capture the sounds of the Zoque community in southern Mexico as they build a network to return to their ancestral lands. The community was displaced by a devastating volcanic eruption in 1982. (18 mins., digital video)
Apiyemiyeki, image courtesy of the artist
Apiyemiyekî? (Ana Vaz, 2019)
Apiyemiyekî? addresses the genocide of the Waimiri-Atroari people in the 1970s when, during the Brazilian dictatorship, Indigenous lands were invaded for the construction of a national road and the installation of a mining company. An archive of illustrations about the period made by the Waimiri-Atroari reveal a traumatic history that continues to superimpose itself on the present. (29 mins., digital video)
FILM/VIDEO PROGRAMS MADE POSSIBLE BY Cardinal Health Kaufman Development
ADDITIONAL SUPPORT PROVIDED BY Rohauer Collection Foundation
WEXNER CENTER PROGRAMS MADE POSSIBLE BY Greater Columbus Arts Council L Brands Foundation American Electric Power Foundation The Columbus Foundation Ohio Arts Council Mary and C. Robert Kidder Bill and Sheila Lambert Institute of Museum and Library Services Huntington Nationwide Foundation Adam R. Flatto Arlene and Michael Weiss
ADDITIONAL SUPPORT PROVIDED BY Michael and Paige Crane Axium Plastics Jeni’s Splendid Ice Creams Ohio State Energy Partners Washington Prime Group Lisa M. Barton Nancy Kramer Paramount Group, Inc. Business Furniture Installations CASTO E.C. Provini Co., Inc. M-Engineering New England Development Our Country Home ProAmpec
Past Film/Video
Unorthodocs Shorts