Kelly Sears is one of our favorite local filmmakers. Part stop-motion, part digital animation, her video work involves mining found imagery and media from the last 100 years and crafting it into strange, implied narratives. For example, her eerily funny 2010 short video Voice on the Line imagined a covert government agency that spied on citizens through female telephone operators (she told the story with late-1950s archival footage of women talking on switchboard headsets).
In 2003, Sears animated the explicit illustrations in The Joy of Sex and scored it with a Casio-keyboard version of Foreignerยs ยI Want to Know What Love Is,ย and itยs pretty awesome.
As part of its Video Jam series, the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston is screening a selection of her videos, and Sears will be on hand to talk about her process and field questions. We highly recommend getting to know Searsยs original voice ย itยs abstract and weird, and also funny, smart and accessible.
Todayยs Video Jam also features work by BE Johnny (Bree Edwards and Johnny DeKam), who recently collaborated on the A/V installation for The Menil Collectionยs current exhibit ยUpside Down: Arctic Realities.ย 6:30 p.m. 5216 Montrose. For information, call 713โ284โ8250 or visit www.camh.org. Free.
Thu., June 23, 6:30 p.m., 2011
This article appears in Jun 23-29, 2011.