Becoming Animal will be presented at Pixxelpoint 20th International Festival of Contemporary Art Practices, in Nova Gorica, Slovenia, on November 16, 2019. The theme of the festival is “Checked Reality. The Work at the Interface Continues,” and includes a symposium and workshops on intersections between art, science, and technology.
Peter will present a special screening of Gambling, Gods and LSD in person at this year’s Meteoric Truth or Consequences documentary film festival in Truth or Consequences, New Mexico, from October 18–20th.
Gambling Gods and LSD with Peter Mettler in person – Spaceport Visitors Center, Friday October 18th, 2:30pm
Becoming Animal will be presented at 9e Rencontres de cinéma Terra Nostra in Saint Martin de Lansuscle, Cévennes, on October 13th!
Becoming Animal will be presented at the Art Gallery of Hamilton on Sunday October 27th, 3:30pm, as part of the AGH Film Festival!
We’ve created a new mailing list for Peter’s news, screenings, and project updates! We promise never to share your contact and only to email a few times per year with only the most important stuff!
Here is our newsletter for Fall 2019. It includes information on Peter’s workshop in Cuba, screenings of Becoming Animal, our new VOD listings, and more.
Hot Docs Ted Rogers Cinema, 506 Bloor St. W., Toronto
ONE SCREENING ONLY! Saturday, October 5th - 9:00pm
Journey into the natural world in a way you never have before in this unforgettable big screen sensory experience. Acclaimed filmmakers Peter Mettler (Gambling, Gods and LSD) and Emma Davie (I Am Breathing) team up with ecological philosopher David Abram for a wholly immersive audio-visual quest through the intricate wildlife of the Grand Teton National Park. Through state-of-the-art camera techniques and mesmerizing shots of landscapes, plants, insects, and animals, Becoming Animal shifts our perspective of the world around us and its inextricably interconnected parts. Think Planet Earth, but in hyper-drive.
Co-director Peter Mettler will be present for a live post-screening Q&A.
For screening details and to purchase tickets, visit the Hot Docs Cinema website.
PETER METTLER MASTERCLASS WORKSHOP – Escuela Internacional de Cine y Television
November 11-29, 2019
To go faraway and film close to.
To discover a territory and discover yourself.
To observe everyday life and tell true stories.
At the heart of the movie gesture, from the shot to the narrative.
The Cuban cinema school Escuela Internacional de Cine y Television has invited Peter Mettler to teach an extended workshop from November 11-29, 2019. Enrollment is open for anyone. Visit EICTV’s website for details.
“If you create, or want to create, beyond established and compartmentalized academic genres, if you have made one or many films: come with your experiences and projects, join this realization workshop piloted by Peter Mettler, whose exciting work is widely recognized internationally. In collaboration with Jean Perret, responsible for this Gran Taller/Great Workshop, and Jorge Yglesias, head of the Master of Alternative Cinema of the International School of Film and Television (EICTV) of San Antonio de los Baños, Cuba. Three weeks to explore a region in a Caribbean country, and make a movie…
“Peter Mettler embodies what contemporary cinema loves to be, a trajectory of discovery in which the shot is the very foundation of creation.
"After the exploration of Peter Mettler's work, each participant will be invited to make a short film by drawing a personal and unique path. Research, filming, editing: at every stage, dialogues, visions, personalized advice, monitoring of the works until the end.
“Peter Mettler's film essay is one of those who return to the world its obvious complexity, its irreducible alterity. With his viewer, he builds first times’ with the demiurgic ambition of the stubborn artist-artisan he is. Fascinating, inspiring, positively scandalous images that build a poetic and political experience of our awareness of the time of life that passes. ” (Jean Perret)
PARTICIPANTS: Graduates or students of artistic careers, audiovisual professionals or artists of any age from any country.
DURATION AND DATES: 3 weeks, from November 11 to 29, 2019.
NUMBER OF STUDENTS: A maximum of 25 students of any nationality.
WORKSHOP LANGUAGE: English, with Spanish translation.
APPLICATIONS: Application reception expiring date: October 20, 2019. Communication of results: October 23, 2019.
COST: 2500 Euros. Pre-registration: € 500, before October 25, 2019. Payment for the rest of the workshop November 11, 2019.
CONTACT: mettlereictv@gmail.com
Becoming Animal is released in theaters in Germany with GM Films this August and September!
Augsburg
ab 29.08.2019 im Thalia, Obstmarkt 5
Berlin
ab 29.08.2019 im fsk, Segitzdamm 2
ab 29.08.2019 in Tilsiter-Lichtspiele, Richard-Sorge-Straße 25a
ab 30.08.2019 im city kino wedding, Müllerstraße 74
Bremen
ab 29.08.2019 im Cinema im Ostertor, Ostertorsteinweg 105
Dortmund
ab 29.08.2019 im sweetSixteen-kino im Depot, Immermannstraße 29
Frankfurt am Main
ab 29.08.2019 im Kino Mal seh'n, Adlerflychtstraße 6
Hannover
ab 29.08.2019 im Kino im Künstlerhaus, Sophienstraße 2
Ingolstadt
ab 29.08.2019 im Union, Josef-Ponschab-Straße 1
Kiel
ab 23.08.2019 in der pumpe, Haßstraße 22
Leipzig
ab 29.08.2019 im Luru Kino in der Spinnerei, Spinnereistraße 7
München
ab 29.08.2019 im Werkstattkino, Fraunhoferstraße 9
Nürnberg
ab 29.08.2019 im Cinecittà, Gewerbemuseumsplatz 3
Potsdam
ab 29.08.2019 im Thalia, Rudolf-Breitscheid-Straße 50
Stuttgart
ab 29.08.2019 im Cinema, Königstraße 22
BECOMING ANIMAL ist ein wunderbares KINOerlebnis und hat eine schöne Nebenwirkung: es bleibt lange in den Sinnen! Wir freuen uns, wenn Ihr Euch Zeit dafür nehmt!
Davon handelt der Film:
Sein Geweih ist majestätisch, sein Blick durchdringend. So steht er da und sieht uns an, der Elch, mitten im Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming, der seine Heimat ist. Es ist eine Welt, in der die Lebewesen, die sie auf unendliche Weise bereichern, den Vortritt haben und in die wir uns behutsam einfühlen – mal aus der Vogelperspektive, dann wieder ganz nah, unmittelbar mit den Sinnen erfassend, wie die Schnecke, die ihre Fühler tastend in die Umgebung streckt. Denn nur so, heisst es in dem Essayfilm von Emma Davie (I am Breathing) und Peter Mettler (End of Time), lassen sich Beziehungen herstellen zwischen dem, was wir sind, und dem, was uns umschliesst: Mensch und Tier, Raum und Zeit, Körper und Intuitionen. Gemeinsam mit dem Philosophen und radikalen Denker David Abram begeben sich die schottische Dokumentarfilmerin und ihr kanadisch-Schweizer Kollege auf eine faszinierend sensorische Entdeckungsreise in die Natur, um den Zuschauer anhand von Beobachtungen und Reflexionen zurückzuführen an einen Punkt, der die Abhängigkeit und Rückwirkung zwischen menschlichen und animalischen Kräften erneut greifbar macht. Auf Tuchfühlung mit Büffeln, Raben, heissen Quellen und rauschenden Wäldern kommen sie dabei zu erstaunlichen Einsichten und Ansichten über das Hier und Jetzt und dessen viele Vorgeschichten.
Becoming Animal has been presented at the following recent festivals:
Edinburgh Science Festival, UK
Seoul Eco Film Festival, Korea
Ecofest International Ecology Film Festival, Bucharest, Romania
Human Rights Nights, Bologna, Italy
ANFFIS Animal Film Festival, Suncheon, Korea
NEW! The original soundtracks for Gambling, Gods and LSD and The Top Of His Head are now available on Bandcamp! Previously available only in extremely limited CD releases, these albums feature music by Fred Frith, Jane Siberry, Peter Bräker, Jim O'Rourke, Fennesz and more!
Listen and purchase at https://grimthorpefilm.bandcamp.com
Kaverne Espros, Sargans, Switzerland – June 28 - August 18, 2019
Opening: Friday, June 19, 2019
Notes From the Underground will be presented at “Unter Tag – Kulturgut der Zukunft,” a curated show of thirteen artists installed in a giant cave in a mountain. Featuring works by Asi Föcker, Gabriela Gerber/Lukas Bardill, Florian Germann, Andy Guhl, Nicolò Krättli and Jonathan Banz, Barblina Meierhans, Peter Mettler, Timo Müller, Ursula Palla, Ilona Ruegg, and Matthias Rüegg.
For more information, visit the Kanton St. Gallen website here.
“A long time ago, when I was still a teenager, I snuck into the Oracle of Delphi at night with two friends, to sleep in the open air on the ancient stones. The next morning, my friends found out that they had dreamt the same images: an excessive bacchanalian procession of our ancestors. I, on the other hand, could not remember anything... Maybe this is why I, for decades, have been searching for the signs and the essence of our future in the intoxication of images and sounds – the ones I create myself and the ones that surround us and affect us.”
For Bildrausch – Filmfest Basel, Peter Mettler has crafted a new installation, entitled The Oracle, that channels his search for true and profound images. This work will be projected onto the ceiling of Stadtkino Basel for the next year, inviting viewers to enjoy a sensorial and pictorial ecstasy.
Bildrausch – Filmfest Basel – Basel, Switzerland
Opening: Thursday June 20th at 20:45 Stadtkino-Bar
For more information, visit Bildrausch – Filmfest Basel’s website.
Picture of Light will be presented at Cinéma Spoutnik in Geneva, Switzerland, on June 17, 2019, as part of the OSMOSCOSMOS exhibition. The screening will be followed by a reading by author Peter Weber, accompanied by slides by Andreas Züst. For more information, please visit the OSMOSCOSMOS website.
Cinéma Spoutnik – 11 Rue de la Coulouvrenière, 1204 Geneva
Andreas Züst and Peter Mettler in Churchill, Manitoba, during the filming of Picture of Light.
Notes From the Underground (2019), a new installation by Peter Mettler, is at Videoex 2019 in Zürich, Switzerland, from May 25th to June 2nd!
Upcoming screenings of Becoming Animal –
Art Cinema Ponrepo, Agosto Foundation, Prague, Czech Republic – May 15, 2019.
Seoul Eco Film Festival, South Korea – May 23–29, 2019.
9Ecofest International Ecology Film Festival, Bucharest – May 2019.
Human Rights Nights, Bologna, Italy – June 2, 2019.
Gladstone Hotel, Toronto, Canada
Check out a new video installation by Peter Mettler at Grow Op 2019!
Notes From the Underground is a single-channel continuously looping video installation that provides a window into the very creation of our world – the literal ground we walk on – in real time. Images of molten lava provide a cascading array of alchemical forms that transmute rock elements into visual echoes of soft tissues, liquid clouds, arrested flames, and anthropomorphic hallucinations. Notes From the Underground is like a fireplace channel for Gaia, in which the cauldron of the earth forms the ground from which our selves and all our expressions emerge.
Grow Op 2019 at the Gladstone Hotel celebrates its seventh year with an exhibition of art, design and ideas across a range of disciplines. The 2019 edition considers ENERGY – Clean energy, dirty energy, social energy, positive energy, negative energy, climate energy, embodied energy, resilient energy. Do we hoard, waste, commodify, burn it, or do we store, reuse, renew it? How humans and other species live within and without natural systems of growth, change, abundance, scarcity, decay and life.
Curated by Christine Leu and Alan Webb of LeuWebb Projects, with Lee Petrie, Exhibitions Director, Gladstone Hotel.
EXHIBITION HOURS:
Wed Apr 17: 7pm – 9pm
Thurs Apr 18: 11am- 10pm – Opening party 7-10pm
Fri Apr 19: 11am – 9pm
Sat Apr 20: 10am – 5pm
Sun Apr 21: 10am – 5pm
General admission $10 | Family pass $25 | Students $5
Contributing artists: Maria Thereza Alves, Sally Ayre, David Ballantine, Bruno Billio, Sarah Carlson, Shaun de Rooy, Joseph Farrugia, Noni Kaur, Mary Kavanagh, Dana Korre, Justin Langille and Jennifer Martin, Peter Mettler, Sarah Moreau, Sarah Norman and Julia Smachylo, Cindy Norton, Leah Oates, Julie Pasila, Chrissy Poitras and Kyle Topping and Jennie Suddick, Leah Oates, Meghan Price, Jessica Rysyk, The Grove Public School, The Stomata Collective, Tosca Teran, Ryan van der Hout, Natalie Majaba Waldburger, Alicia Wright, Daniel Rotsztain, Native Land.
For more information visit https://www.gladstonehotel.com/Grow-Op // #growop2019
Cambridge, MA
Harvard University’s Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts presents a screening of Becoming Animal, followed by an open conversation, “Between the Human Animal and the Animate Earth,” with David Abram and Lucien Castaing-Taylor (Director of Harvard’s Sensory Ethnography Lab).
For more information, visit https://college.harvard.edu/between-human-animal-and-animate-earth
From Harvard’s website: “David Abram – cultural ecologist and geophilosopher – is the author of Becoming Animal: An Earthly Cosmology, and of The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More-than-Human World. Described as ‘daring’ and ‘truly original’ by Science, and as “revolutionary” by the Los Angeles Times Dr. Abram’s work has helped catalyze the emergence of several new disciplines, including the burgeoning field of ecopsychology. A close student of the traditional ecological knowledge of diverse indigenous peoples, David was the first contemporary philosopher to advocate for a reappraisal of “animism” as a complexly nuanced and uniquely viable worldview. He has been the recipient of numerous awards, and recently held the international Arne Naess Chair in Global Justice and the Environment in Norway. Dr. Abram is creative director of the Alliance for Wild Ethics (AWE), an organization dedicated to cultural metamorphosis through a rejuvenation of place-based oral culture–the culture of face-to-face and face-to-place storytelling. He lives with his family in the foothills of the southern Rockies.”
Nyon, France
Peter will be attending this year's Visions Du Réel Festival to participate on a jury in the Industry section for new project pitches.
Check out the lineup at https://www.visionsdureel.ch/en
Hamburg, Germany
Peter will attend this year’s Dokumentarfilmwoche Hamburg in person to present Becoming Animal and Gambling, Gods and LSD.
For more info:
Becoming Animal – Friday, April 5th, 22h00
Gambling, Gods and LSD – Saturday April 6th, 17h45
Becoming Animal (2018)
Gambling, Gods and LSD (2002)
Outside The Box presents the Swiss-French premiere of Becoming Animal, with Peter Mettler in person!
Screenings:
16 March - 19h00 – Lausanne – CityClub Pully – followed by a DJ set by Vincent Hänni and projection of Gambling, Gods and LSD
17 March - 20h00 – Neuchâtel – Minimum
18 March - 20h00 – Cinéma d’Oron
20 March - 20h30 – Genève – Cinélux
21 March - 20h00 – Delémont – La Grange
22 March - 20h30 – Sainte-Croix – Royal
For more information, visit Outside The Box’s website, or the official Becoming Animal website.