Maya Deren – Voodoo Priest

Witch's Cradle outtakes

Maya Deren, USA, 1943, 10 minutesMaya Deren's never released, short film Witch's Cradle was based on footage shot around the New York Surrealist Exhibition of 1942 that featured work by Marcel Duchamp. This edit of excerpts from that film, which will include brief images of Duchamp himself, is a remarkable work that gives free reign to witchcraft, a subject dear to Deren's heart.

Divine Horsemen: the Living Gods of Haiti by Maya Deren

Maya Deren, USA, 1947-1951, 55 minutesBetween 1947 and 1951 Maya Deren spent a substantial amount of time on Haiti where she shot lots of footage of voodoo rituals. On one of her trips, Deren was even inaugurated as a voodoo priestess herself. The film was only edited together after her death and the commentary, based on her eponymous book from 1953, was also added posthumously.Her filmed poetry brings art and ethnography together in which Haitian dances are contrasted to non-Haitian elements in a series of dream-like sequences that are presented as an alternative reality, inherited from surrealism.Performance by Samira Elagoz and Jeanette GroenendaalLive music by Mola Sylla - voice, kalimba. Vincent Pino - electric guitar.