New York, NY, The School of Visual Arts MFA Photo, Video, and Related Media is pleased to announce the screening of Laura Parnes’ Tour Without End. Preceding the screening, Parnes will introduce the film in conversation with film critic Amy Taubin (Art Forum) and writer, songwriter, and musician Johanna Fateman (Le Tigre).
An official selection of the 2018 Sarasota Film Festival, Tour Without End is an experimental narrative comedy/documentary hybrid film. Casting real-life musicians, artists, and actors as fictional bands on tour, the film evolves into a cross-generational commentary on contemporary culture and politics in the Trump era. Shot over the course of 4 years between 2014-2018, at over 15 DIY music spaces in and around NYC, Tour Without End functions as a time capsule made more apparent by the shuttering of many of the films’ locations due to NYC’s rapid gentrification.
The film’s multitude of characters are legendary performers in the downtown NYC arts scene including Wooster Group founder Kate Valk, Jim Fletcher (The NYC Players), musicians Lizzi Bougatsos, (Gang Gang Dance), Kathleen Hanna (The Julie Ruin), Brontez Purnell (The Younger Lovers), Eileen Myles, Alexandra Drewchin (Eartheater), Nicole Eisenman, K8 Hardy, Johanna Fateman (Le Tigre) Shannon Funchess (Light Asylum), JD Samson (MEN), Gary Indiana, Kembra Pfahler, (Voluptuous Horror of Karen Black), Rachel Mason, Tom McGrath, Matthew Asti (MGMT), Becca Blackwell, Christen Clifford, Alessandra Genovese (Crush), Rogelio Ramos (Love Pig), Kenya Robinson (Cheeky LaShae) and Neon Music (Youth Quake).
Shot in real environments and situations, the core group of players improvise based on semi-scripted scenes. Many of these performers are legendary in the downtown NYC arts scene and become archetypes playing archetypes. As the players move in and out of their real-life identities and roles as fictionalized characters, the film moves in and out of non-linear narrative, complicating the work as historical document.
The film revels in the sometimes hilarious but always-complex band dynamics that the characters endure while touring, collaborating, and aging in a youth-driven music industry. The sometimes self-indulgent bubble the bands exist within is burst when, while on tour, they attend the protests surrounding the Republican convention. Drawing connections between past and present, the film draws from the current political climate and the rockumentary tradition of ‘This Is Spinal Tap’ and ‘Medium Cool’ to assert that no one exists outside of politics.
This event is open to the public and free of charge. To RSVP click here.