PREDICTIONS OF FIRE

Begin forwarded message:

> PREDICTIONS OF FIRE
> A Film About Art, Politics, and War
> ***with director Michael Benson in person!***
>
> when: 6 pm, Friday, November 9th
> where: room 3226, 400 So. Peoria Street (Art & Design Hall, UIC)
> mass transit: take the blue line to the UIC-Halsted stop, get off
> at front
> of train, turn left onto Peoria street.
> screening is Free and open to the public.
>
> SYNOPSIS:
> Until 1991 the Western republic of Socialist Yugoslavia, Slovenia's
> violent secession struck the first spark in the Balkan war which
> defined
> the first chapter of the post-cold war era. Using an inventive
> combination
> of reportage, dramatization, archival footage, animation and
> miniatures,
> Predictions of Fire is a revealing study of the controversial and
> internationally acclaimed Slovenian arts collective NSK, as seen
> through
> the lens of 20th century Central European history. Shot in Ljubljana,
> Moscow, New York, Belgrade, and Athens, this visually arresting film
> offers a portrait of a culture suspended between East and West. By
> documenting NSK, Predictions of Fire holds a mirror up to Europe
> and the
> world, analyzing the way nations are brought into conformity with
> ideology.
> The film won the Canadian Film Board's Best Documentary award at
> the 1996
> Vancouver International Film Festival. The jury issued a statement:
> "Predictions of Fire is intellectual dynamite. It explodes the
> icons and
> myths of communism and capitalism. Out of the shattered history of
> Slovenia, this film constructs a new way of looking at art,
> politics, and
> religion."
>
> In the early 80's, an industrial rock band named Laibach emerged
> out of
> the tiny Yugoslav republic of Slovenia. Incorporating what many
> took to be
> fascist imagery in their performances, they shocked this tiny Balkan
> republic and, after signing a recording contract with London's
> prestigious
> Mute Records label, went on to shock the rest of the world as well.
> Laibach was soon joined by a painting group, Irwin, and theater
> group, Red
> Pilot, at the helm of one of the most ambitious and cutting-edge arts
> collectives in the world. Modeled after a socialist state
> bureaucracy, and
> calling themselves Neue Slowenische Kunst (New Slovenian Arts, or
> NSK),
> these three groups became the titular heads of a micro-state within
> the
> independent republic of Slovenia. NSK recently began issuing its own
> passports and opened embassies and consulates in Moscow, Berlin,
> Ghent,
> Florence, and in the US.
>
> Although Predictions of Fire documents the NSK collective, positioning
> their work within the history of ex-Yugoslavia, the film emerges as
> much
> more than an arts documentary. Predictions of Fire offers surprising
> insight into the Yugoslav conflict and the ongoing trauma
> experienced by
> generations of Eastern Europeans raised in totalitarian regimes.
> Variety
> wrote that the film "uses a postmodern, quasi-Godardian sensibility to
> show how politics invades every facet of artistic creation and how
> integral ideology is to the understanding of the structure and
> signification of images… An extremely rich tapestry of historical
> events
> and their mythic implications in both art and politics unfolds
> onscreen."
>
> Review blurbs:
>
> "Riveting… fascinating… intriguing… An extremely rich
> tapestry of
> historical events and their mythic implications unfolds onscreen…
> With
> it's rich visual imagery,