In 1916 the Italian Futurist artist Arnaldo Ginna filmed, edited and generally oversaw the creation of Vita Futurista (Futurist Life), the only officially “Futurist” film ever made. Created by a committee of futurists, including sculptor, painter and writer Giacomo Balla, playwright and poet Remo Chiti, writer Bruno Corra (also the brother of Ginna, and the co-creator of Ginna’s hand painted completely abstract films of 1909), founder of Futurism, poet, and declaimer F.T. Marinetti, poet and Author Emilio Settimelli, painter and Ginna’s film assistant Lucia Venna and Paolo Ungari, Vita Futurista directly took up several of the ideas proposed by “The Futurist Cinema” manefesto, which delacred that film was the “expressive medium most adapted to the complete sensibility of the Futurist artist.”

On the occasion of Performa 09’s celebration of Futurism, Performa, SFMOMA and Portland Green Cultural Projects had invited an incredible group of contemporary film and video artists to create their own versions of the original segments in Vita Futurista, re-imagining this film in relation to our future.

Martha Colburn’s One and One is Lifewas inspired by “Introspective Research into States of Mind”.

Martha Colburn’s work uses language and materials of film, music and painting to create works that culminate in Live performances. “In my films I take on contemporary subjects and make music videos using my personalized style of frame-by-frame cut-out animation. It’s through this handmade animation technique that I am able to leap centuries, cultures, locations, private, public and imagined spaces to assemble highly charged full colour gritty contemporary film fable.” Film and music performances by colburn have been presented at San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, The Whitney Museum of Art and Art Basel Switzerland.

RIGHTS CONTACT: not held