Cinemas of Transgression

In the late 1970s, the New York Underground bred a new mutation in film and video, willfully crude and confrontational in form and content. Itself an outgrowth of punk and No Wave, its practitioners dubbed it the “Cinema of Transgression.” This program looks at the legacies of these provocations with the thesis that there are many cinemas of transgression, far beyond the initial Death-Trip. These films mock and profane the sacred cows of art and cinema, violate the material image itself, oppose the dominant politick, and confront the culture with elements it prefers to leave unexamined. The Dervish Machine. 1992. USA. Directed by Bradley Eros, Jeanne Liotta. 16mm. 9 min. Mayhem. 1987. USA. Directed by Abigail Child. 16mm. 16 min. The Scary Movie. 1996. USA. Directed by Peggy Ahwesh. 16mm. 9 min. Hollywood Landing: The Peg Entwhistle Story. 2025. USA. Directed by Joe Wakeman. 16mm. 10 min. Nymphomania. 1994. USA. Directed by Tessa Hughes Freeland. Digital. 9 min. The House of Water #29: The Abyss. 2019. USA. Directed by Lili White. Digital. 5 min. A Facile Appropriation. 2024. USA. Directed by Preston Spurlock. Digital. 6 min. ZEROZEROZEROZERO. 2022. USA. Directed by Tempest Creation. Digital. 5 min. Episode. 1996. USA. Directed by Joey Huertas. Digital. 8 min. The Taking of Jordan (All American Boy). 2022. Canada. Directed by Kalil Haddad. Digital. 7 min. Chop Off. 2008. USA. Directed by M M Serra. Digital. 6 min. Palcorecore. 2023. Palestine, UAE. Directed by Dana Dawud. Digital. 5 min. time is a bird. 2026. USA. Directed by Gloria Chung. Digital. 4 min. Program approx. 100 min.