YARAT FILM CLUB PRESENTS SHEZAD DAWOOD’S FILMS 16 May 15 YARAT Contemporary Art Center is proud to invite you to attend a second session of YARAT Film Club at 19:00 on May 16 2015. YARAT Film Club aims to become an informal meeting point for the viewing and discussion of contemporary art videos and films. This time the club will host a screening of Shezad Dawood’s feature film “Piercing Brightness”. The author will be in attendance and will be answering your questions after the screening. This event was organized in partnership with British Council, Azerbaijan. Film will be shown in English with English subtitles. Piercing Brightness (2013) Piercing Brightness is a science fiction film directed by internationally acclaimed artist Shezad Dawood. The film utilizes science fiction as a backdrop from which to contest fixed notions of race, migration and identity. The plot interweaves elements of documentary, within a character-driven narrative involving the different and changing communities in Preston, in the North of England and points to Lancashire's position as having the highest UFO sighting rate and the fastest growing Mainland Chinese population in the UK. The film combines digital and analogue processes, high production values and low-fi aesthetics to tell a story through both its narrative and distortions of time brought about by experiments with the various formats used. The story begins with Jiang and Shin, a young Chinese boy and girl, who land in a spacecraft outside of Preston. They have been sent on a mission to retrieve the 'Glorious 100' - agents who were sent to this planet millennia ago to study. Shezad Dawood b.1974, graduated from Central St Martin’s and the Royal College of Art, completed a PhD at Leeds Metropolitan University. Dawood works across film, painting and sculpture to juxtapose discrete systems of image, language, site and multiple narratives, using the editing process as a method to explore meanings and forms between film and painting. His practice often involves collaboration, working with groups and individuals across different territories to physically and conceptually map far-reaching lines of enquiry. Recent international exhibitions include: Taipei Biennial (2014), Marrakech Biennial (2014) MACBA Barcelona (2014), MoMA PS1 (2014), Witte de With (2013), Modern Art Oxford (2012), Busan Biennale (2010), Tate Britain (2009), and the 53rd Venice Biennale (2009). Recent projects include: Feature film Piercing Brightness (2013), a solo exhibition at Parasol Unit, London, Leeds Art Gallery (2014) and at OCAT Xi’an, China (2014). Shezad is a Jarman Award nominee (2012) and one of the winners of the Abraaj Capital Art Prize (2011). He currently lives and works in London, where he is Research Fellow in Experimental Media at the University of Westminster. Venue: YARAT Contemporary Art Centre Bayil district (near the National Flag square), Baku, Azerbaijan. Preview day: 16 May 2015 Time: 19.00

• published: 09 Jun 2015
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