Souvenir of Lebanon

Souvenir of Lebanon

1983 · 6 min

Writes Schneemann: "Souvenir of Lebanon follows a long video pan through destroyed Palestinian and Lebanese villages. In 1982-83, Israeli ceaseless bombardments destroyed bridges, farms, roads, hospitals, schools, libraries, apartments, and historic sites and towns dating back 2000 years. The live color footage was received unexpectedly from an anonymous news photographer. It is intercut with black and white disaster stills I re-shot from daily newspapers, edited in juxtaposition with color slides of bucolic Lebanon given to me on the day the Lebanese tourist bureau in New York city closed." "Souvenir of Lebanon is the video component for the kinetic sculpture War Mop; a flailing motorized mop rises on plexiglass cams and is dropped, slapping the video monitor every eight seconds. The sound on the video recorded layers of reverberation as the mop hit the monitor."

Directed by Carolee Schneemann

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Times For · 1970

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"Meat Joy is an erotic rite — excessive, indulgent, a celebration of flesh as material: raw fish, chicken, sausages, wet paint, transparent plastic, ropes, brushes, paper scrap. Its propulsion is towards the ecstatic — shifting and turning among tenderness, wildness, precision, abandon; qualities that could at any moment be sensual, comic, joyous, repellent. Physical equivalences are enacted as a psychic imagistic stream, in which the layered elements mesh and gain intensity by the energy complement of the audience. The original performances became notorious and introduced a vision of the 'sacred erotic.' This video was converted from original film footage of three 1964 performances of Meat Joy at its first staged performance at the Festival de la Libre Expression, Paris, Dennison Hall, London, and Judson Church, New York City."

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MovieDocumentary

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