Donna: Vrouwen in verzet

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Eye Filmmuseum

Wednesday 27 September, Eye is closed. We apologise for any inconvenience caused.

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Eye Filmmuseum seen across the river IJ © Marcus Koppen

Eye Filmmuseum, © Marcus Koppen

In an impressionistic black and white image made up in virtual reality, a number of women, of all ages and all dressed in large late-Victorian dresses, are pictured floating around a space which has old images of city housing as its background (campaign image Walzer (Leo Erken & Frieda Gustavs, NL 2022))

campaign image Walzer (Leo Erken & Frieda Gustavs, NL 2022)

still from Impossible Image (Karen Pearlman, US 2023)

still Impossible Image (Karen Pearlman, US 2023)

Two protesting women stand encircled by police officers wearing helmets, they appear to be shouting, one has her first raised in the air (campaign image Meet the Archive 2023)

campaign image Meet the Archive 2023 (still from Donna: vrouwen in verzet (Yvonne Scholten, NL 1980))

still from Donna: vrouwen in verzet (Yvonne Scholten, NL 1980)

still Donna: vrouwen in verzet (Yvonne Scholten, NL 1980)

poster Donna: vrouwen in verzet (Yvonne Scholten, NL 1980)

still from Apocalypse: The Four Nightmares (Wanderwelle)

still Apocalypse: The Four Nightmares (Wanderwelle)

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About Eye

Every year, the kaleidoscopic nature of Eye’s collection is underlined when our collection experts step into the spotlights during Meet the Archive. Eye’s experts provide exceptional stories from (early) cinema history, highlighting forgotten filmmakers. Free admission: collect a ticket from the box office on the day.

Wanderwelle: The Four Nightmares (60’) Amsterdam-based collective Wanderwelle, consisting of Alexander Bartels and Phil van Dulm, presents their experimental collage film The Four Nightmares. The film depicts the story of an anonymous man plagued by a series of feverish dreams that foretell the end of time. The great crises of our time follow one another like hallucinatory nightmares with no escape. The Four Nightmares is influenced by the Bible book The Revelation of John in which the four horsemen of the Apocalypse wreak death and destruction. Despite the unpleasant idea, the prophetic book has many parallels with our modern world. Large-scale disease outbreaks, wars, ecological disasters and false prophets are commonplace nowadays and it seems the four horsemen have already made their entrance on the world stage. Surreal plot The source material of The Four Nightmares comes from Eye's collection. Instead of focusing on the physical material, which is common in the found footage genre, Wanderwelle chose to focus strongly on narrative and allegorical references. By cutting up archival footage, re-editing it, manipulating it through digital techniques and adding sound design and music, the artists created a fast-pacing surreal plot of their own. The film's grainy look and bleak imagery emphasize the existential fear of the bedridden protagonist. Prior to the film, the video installation The Summer of '72 (Fire) will be shown. In a split-screen format, archival footage of classrooms from the 1970s is juxtaposed with forest fire imagery. Slowly but surely, the fire intensifies and the school is bound to be engulfed by flames. Wanderwelle made the piece to complement The Four Nightmares, which narrates a similar message, that of impending doom in the form of natural disasters. In 1972, the Club of Rome published the highly influential report The Limits to Growth. The study suggested that economic growth could not continue indefinitely due to resource depletion, which eventually could result in catastrophic environmental issues. A modern prophecy that came true half a century later. In this way, the video installation portrays the missed opportunity of how education could have substantially changed the current state of the climate crisis if the youth had been properly schooled at the time. An interview with Alexander Bartels and Phil van Dulm will take place between the screenings of the installation and the fil

Wanderwelle meets the Eye-Collection

Every year, the kaleidoscopic nature of Eye’s collection is underlined when our collection experts step into the spotlights during Meet the Archive (free admission). Eye’s experts provide exceptional stories from (early) cinema history, highlighting forgotten filmmakers.

On Saturday 3 June 2023, Eye’s curators and restorers will talk about their latest research projects. Topics will include exceptional finds, special bequests to the archive and the forgotten works of pioneering female filmmakers. Free admission: collect your ticket from the box office on the day.

Restoration, Digitisation & Re-Use

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On this opening night of the Eye International Conference, we will present a brand new restoration of a title from the Cinemien collection, Donna: Women in Revolt (1980). Yvonne Scholten impressively portrays 80 years of women's resistance in Italy. Free admission: collect a ticket from the box office on the day.

Eye has advocated for more attention to the role of women in cinema for decades and has undertaken several initiatives on women and (re)writing a more inclusive film history. In 2022, Eye started an oral history pilot study regarding the collection of the feminist film collective Cinemien, which was founded in 1974. Yvonne Scholten is one of the women interviewed in the oral history project. In Donna: Vrouwen in verzet, Yvonne Scholten impressively portrays 80 years of women's resistance in Italy. Starting from the brutal fascist attack on the Roman free radio station Radio Donna, during a Housewives' Collective broadcast in January 1979, follows a search for the backgrounds of the Italian women's movement through extraordinary archival footage and interviews. Scholten speaks to women who opposed any form of oppression (fascist movements, church, political parties, etc.). Forgotten roles The film covers many topics in an accessible manner: the divide between feminists at the beginning of the century and women in the peasant and labour movements of the time, the "women's issue" in the major left-wing parties after the war and second-wave feminism. This film provides a broader understanding of (often forgotten) women's roles in history. A Season of Classic Film Curator Simona Monizza, researcher Gerdien Smit and director Yvonne Scholten introduce the premiere of the digital restoration. The restoration of Donna: Vrouwen in verzet is a collaboration between the Netherlands Institute for Sound &amp; Vision and Eye Filmmuseum. The restoration has been made possible thanks to <a href="https://ace-film.eu/projects/season-of-classics/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">A Season of Classic Films</a>, an initiative of Association des Cinémathèques Européennes (ACE) supported by the EU Creative Europe MEDIA programme. A Season of Classic Films brings European films closer to audiences through a programme of free film screenings, provided by national and regional film archives, throughout Europe. Donna: Vrouwen in verzet is the first screening in the 2023 series of several screenings of restored films organised by ACE around Europe. Free entrance: get a ticket at the box office on the day itself.

Ample attention will also be paid to the recently bequeathed archives of the renowned Netherlands’ film producer, Matthijs van Heijningen. Admission is free.

Meet the Archive 2023

Meet the Archive 2023: Donna: Vrouwen in verzet

The VR experience Walzer by Frieda Gustavs and Leo Erken takes you on a journey through a landscape consisting of thousands of photographs of women from the first wave of feminism (1850 - 1940). The duo have developed a new way of making archival material accessible to all using virtual reality.

The photographs, which are sometimes over 100 years old, are given new life and meaning in Walzer. The unknown portraits were collated from private collections, found on Marktplaats or at flea markets. Thousands of personal female histories were hidden in those boxes and albums. These stories can finally be told by morphing these photographs into one another in 3D. Tales, songs and poems are whispered, sung, screamed and told by voices in eight different languages. Walzer thereby revives the first wave of feminism (1850 - 1940).

Walzer

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Donna: Vrouwen in verzet

Meet the Archive 2023: Donna: Vrouwen in verzet

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