Lux Æterna: The Art of Filmmaking

FUCK TV

August 2019 •English

After concluding the now-legendary public access TV series, The Pain Factory, Michael Nine embarked on a new and more subversive public access endeavor: a collaboration with Scott Arford called Fuck TV. Whereas The Pain Factory predominantly revolved around experimental music performances, Fuck TV was a comprehensive and experiential audio-visual presentation. Aired to a passive and unsuspecting audience on San Francisco’s public access channel from 1997 to 1998, each episode of Fuck TV was dedicated to a specific topic, combining video collage and cut-up techniques set to a harsh electronic soundtrack. The resultant overload of processed imagery and visceral sound was unlike anything presented on television before or since. EPISODES: Yule Bible, Cults, Riots, Animals, Executions, Static, Media, Haterella (edited version), Self Annihilation Live, Electricity.

Invocation of the Memory of Mary Turner, lynched on May 19, 1918

October 2024 •English

A stasis work invoking the memory of the lynching of Mary Turner, a young, pregnant African American woman in South Georgia. Publicly demanding justice after the murder of her husband, Turner was kidnapped by a mob, hung up in a tree, set on fire, her child cut out and killed, and shot hundreds of times before being buried on-site in 1918. Returning to the origins of cinema, filmed on the exact date and time of Turner’s lynching 105-years earlier, # 3 uses form, time, light, shadow, and landscape as metaphor to not only invoke the memory of Mary Turner, but to also ponder perspective relating to racial violence, violence against women, our failure to acknowledge our past, and the racial divide that continues to exist today in the schizophrenia of America life.

Voidland

Invalid date •English

This is an amateur student mood piece comprised of footage I've filmed with my Camcorder at uni over the course of the first half of 2023. The prompt given for this was 'belonging' and so I've gravitated it around the premise of navigating a place that you feel as though you don't belong in, to the point where you become detached and alienated from your own identity. - Toby.

Six Degrees of Separation

December 1993 •English

The story of a young, gay, black, con artist who, posing as the son of Sidney Poitier, cunningly maneuvers his way into the lives of a white, upper-class New York family.

ART MADE ME DISAPPEAR

November 2020 •Spanish

A young artist is caught in a physical and mental battle against a supernatural entity that forces him to free it from its dark prison, ¿or is it just his imagination?

Empire of the Nude: The Victorian Nude

January 2001 •English

The Victorian era is often cited for its lack of sexuality, but as this documentary reveals, the period's artists created a strong tradition surrounding the classical nude figure, which spread from the fine arts to more common forms of expression. The film explains how 19th-century artists were inspired by ancient Greek and Roman works to highlight the naked form, and how that was reflected in the evolving cultural attitudes toward sex.

The Lost Leonardo

August 2021 •English

London, England, 2008. Some of the most distinguished experts on the work of Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) gather at the National Gallery to examine a painting known as Salvator Mundi; an event that turns out to be the first act of one of the most fascinating stories in the history of art.

The Mona Lisa Myth

January 2014 •Italian

The Last Vermeer

September 2019 •English

A soldier and member of the Dutch resistance investigates stolen art in the wake of the Second World War, including a Vermeer sold to the Nazis by a flamboyant forger.

Oblio

November 2018 •Italian

Those Who Wander

August 2022 •English

What are they? What do they seek? When all the lights go out, they will wander. And you will never see them.

Factory Girl

December 2006 •English

In the mid-1960s, wealthy debutant Edie Sedgwick meets artist Andy Warhol. She joins Warhol's famous Factory and becomes his muse. Although she seems to have it all, Edie cannot have the love she craves from Andy, and she has an affair with a charismatic musician, who pushes her to seek independence from the artist and the milieu.

Islamic Art: Mirror of the Invisible World

June 2011 •English

This ninety-minute film takes audiences on an epic journey across nine countries and over 1,400 years of history. It explores themes such as the Word, Space, Ornament, Color and Water and presents the stories behind many great masterworks of Islamic Art and Architecture. Narrated by Academy Award winning performer Susan Sarandon, this dazzling documentary reveals the variety and diversity of Islamic art. It provides a window into Islamic culture and brings broad insights to the enduring themes that have propelled human history and fueled the rise of world civilization over the centuries

Raphael: The Lord of the Arts

April 2017 •Italian

Raphael: The Lord of the Arts is a documentary about the 15th century Italian Renaissance painter Raphael Sanzio.

A Body Appeared At The Lake Today

November 2023 •English

A found footage examination of what happened at the lake today. Where were you? An exquisite corpse by Non Films. 8mm images randomly selected from found footage; poem written without images; music written without images or words. WINNER: BEST BROOKLYN PROJECT (Brooklyn Film Festival).

Grandpa Called It Art

July 1944 •English

This MGM Passing Parade series short takes a look at changing definitions of art in the United States.

21 rue la Boétie

March 2017 •French

Otto Betulle

October 2023 •Italian

Autorretrato

September 2023 •Portuguese

Traces: The Kabul Museum 1988

January 2003 •Japanese

The Kabul National Museum, once known as the "face of Afghanistan," was destroyed in 1993. We filmed the most important cultural treasures of the still-intact museum in 1988: ancient Greco-Roman art and antiquitied of Hellenistic civilization, as well as Buddhist sculpture that was said to have mythology--the art of Gandhara, Bamiyan, and Shotorak among them. After the fall of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan in 1992, some seventy percent of the contents of the museum was destroyed, stolen, or smuggled overseas to Japan and other countries. The movement to return these items is also touched upon. The footage in this video represents that only film documentation of the Kabul Museum ever made.