SAM Films: Dragonfly Eyes

“Everything is art. Everything is politics.” – Ai Weiwei

Inspired by the earmark provocation and disruption of artist/activist Ai Weiwei, SAM presents free screenings of four provocative films from Asian filmmakers in conjunction with the exhibition, Ai, Rebel: The Art and Activism of Ai Weiwei.

Sundays in April and May, encounter documentary, art film, and full freakout cinema whose unconventional styles tackle art reproduction, surveillance, nuclear war, and the “model minority” myth. Originating from China, Japan, and the US, these films demonstrate the relevance of Ai’s philosophies and decrees across borders and time.

Explore how the digital age has evolved the relationship between art and surveillance in this screening of artist Xu Bing's Dragonfly Eyes.

Dragonfly Eyes
Dir. Xu Bing

Like a dragonfly’s prismatic eyes, 200 million or so surveillance cameras ceaselessly record life above China’s street corners, on its car dashboards, and in its private shops. Once uploaded to the cloud database that has housed the footage since 2013, the result is an incredibly vast public archive of life in its most unfiltered form.

In his first feature film, visual artist Xu Bing stitches together bites of this real surveillance footage into a loosely told “story” about a woman living in the city. The resulting assembly is an artifact where the most mundane moments blend with sights so unbelievable you couldn’t even imagine them. When “the entire world has become a gigantic film studio,” Dragonfly Eyes challenges the relationships between art and surveillance, author and machine, reality and fiction.

Content Advisory: Disturbing imagery

Asian Provocation is guest-curated by Hannah Baek.

Films will be screened at Seattle Art Museum
April 6 China's Van Goghs
April 13 Dragonfly Eyes
April 20 Hausu
May 4 Terminal USA

All screenings will be matinees with doors opening at 1:30 pm and films beginning at 2 pm. Join us for community activities accompanying each screening.

SAM Films are generously supported by the Bagley and Virginia Wright Endowment and The Brooks and Suzanne Ragen Film and Education Endowment.