Prismatic Ground is a New York City film festival centered on experimental documentary and avant-garde film, co-hosted by Maysles Documentary Center and media partner Screen Slate. 2022 marks the second ever and first hybrid edition of the festival, with physical events taking place at Maysles, the Museum of the Moving Image, and Anthology Film Archives. The majority of films will simultaneously be available free, worldwide on-demand during the festival dates at http://www.prismaticground.com. New Yorkers are encouraged to attend in person; each program will feature live filmmaker Q&As.
Note: “wave” tickets are purchased as a whole, but patrons are free to come and go during the noted breaks. Once sold out, a limited number of tickets for each program will be available on a first-come basis at the door, and seats that are vacated after breaks will be re-sold. All “waves” screen at Maysles Documentary Center.
wave 10: destroying the earth, over and over again is screening in the cinema on 5/7 for $15/$7 reduced.
Instant Life (in person only, 16mm) (OJOBOCA, 30 min.)
The three films you will see are shot-for-shot reproductions of the compilation film Instant Life (1981). Each film in Instant Life (1981) was a remake of an earlier film also called Instant Life (1941). The earlier Instant Life (1941) was a single film, not a compilation.
A Thousand Years Ago (in person only) (Edgar Jorge Baralt, 20 min.)
In an imaginary look back at the present from the year 2049, an exile returns to Los Angeles decades after being displaced by large scale social and environmental collapse.
A Vessel, the Ideas Pass Through (Linnea Nugent, 6 min.)
Secrets of experiencing and the wandering of mind from an initial landing place through the. haptic view of a lens.
KŌ (Nathan Howe, 30 min)
KŌ is a non-narrated, experimental documentary and the final act of the Hawaiian sugar epoch.
Datura's Aubade (Jean-Jacques Martinod, Bretta C. Walker, 18 min.)
A farmer discovers a fallen meteorite in the high deserts of New Mexico. The Alien Earth and the Earth Alien commingle under the spell of a deadly nightshade.
BREAK
9PM
Deep Impact (Christopher Thompson, 9 min.)
“Deep Impact” explores our deep fatalistic tendencies to design our own catastrophic scenarios in order to enrich our monotonous lives through our simulations of collapse.
Earth II (in person only) (Anti-Banality Union, 97 min.)
Earth, present day. With human civilization facing ever-worsening climate calamities, the captains of industry set their sights on a new planet. Starring Keanu Reeves, Will Smith, and Matt Damon, EARTH II reminds us that no matter how far into its final death spiral our species might be, life finds a way.
