A film that explores the aesthetic, social and environmental dimensions of industrialization and globalization
Friday, March 9th at 5pm in CIRS. This event is part of the 2012 eARTh Forum.
MANUFACTURED LANDSCAPES is a feature length documentary on the world and work of renowned artist Edward Burtynsky. Burtynsky makes large-scale photographs of ‘manufactured landscapes’ – quarries, recycling yards, factories, mines, and dams. He photographs civilization’s materials and debris, but in a way people describe as “stunning” or “beautiful,” and so raises all kinds of questions about ethics and aesthetics without trying to easily answer them.
Shot in Super-16mm film, MANUFACTURED LANDSCAPES extends the narrative streams of Burtynsky’s photographs, allowing us to meditate on our profound impact on the planet and witness both the epicentres of industrial endeavor and the dumping grounds of its waste. What makes the photographs so powerful is his refusal in them to be didactic. We are all implicated here, they tell us: there are no easy answers. The film continues this approach of presenting complexity, without trying to reach simplistic judgments or reductive resolutions. In the process, it tries to shift our consciousness about the world and the way we live in it.
Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ie5SJ39LsDg
Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/375892912436002/
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The eARTh Forum 2012 is a day of activities organized by Common Energy UBC that seek to create a dialogue around art in the context of sustainable development, and specifically to question how and to what extent art and aesthetics can be vehicles for social and behavioral change.
Cinema Politica UBC is a series showcasing documentaries that critically engage in urgent social justice, environmental, economic and gender issues. We believe film is a powerful tool for social change, and are committed to presenting alternative points of view, supporting independent and local filmmakers, and creating a space for discussion and engagement.
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