This year the Images Festival is pleased to focus our Canadian Artist Spotlight on cinematographer Iris Ng. Shooting across genres using a variety of film and video formats, she has made her mark on more than 50 productions over the last decade. Working with visual artists and filmmakers alike, her subtle visual intelligence and generous intuition can be seen in the films and videos in this program, as well as our On Screen Influence of Anxiety program and Off Screen in our Phantom Limbs installation at Scrap Metal Gallery.

Point of Departure

Iris Ng

2008, 26 min, 16mm, Super 8mm, Mini DV on Digital Video, Canada/Hong Kong

Combining audio accounts from family members, archival footage and images collected on a trip to Hong Kong, Ng explores the relationship between contemporary landscapes and the memories and emotions to which they are connected.

Circa 1960

Chris Curreri

2005, 6 min, 16mm, Canada

Perforated with pinpricks and turned back to front, a found snapshot of a landscape becomes animated by a light that is projected through it. Like a diorama, the movement of the light source causes the photographic object to transform from a piece of paper with pinholes into an indexical image of a magical mountain range.

Mount Shasta

Oliver Husain

2008, 8 min, 16mm, Canada

Mount Shasta unfolds like a contemporary fairy tale, shrouded in mystery, fog and smoke. The delicate texture of the images and the accompanying music take us along for the ride.

Moth Maze

Oliver Husain

2012, 7 min, Digital Video, Canada

Created for Nuit Blanche, Moth Maze creates a whimsical playground for both insect and human viewers. Attracted to the light of the screen as the day turns to night, our attention ricochets from twilight to lamplight.

Stories We Tell

Sarah Polley

2012, 0 min, Super 8mm, HD Cam on 35mm, Canada

Excerpt. This elegant hybrid documentary-fiction playfully excavates layers of myth and memory to reveal the truth at the core of a family of storytellers. The textures of reminiscence are expertly recreated via Iris Ng's cinematography.

Service of the Goods

Jean-Paul Kelly

2013, 0 min, 16mm on Digital Video, Canada

Excerpt. Comprised of shot by shot reenactments of scenes from classic Frederick Wiseman documentaries, Service of the Goods underlines the formal codes and conventions of the filmmaker while examining the intersection between representation and abstraction.

Body Like Lead

Stephanie Markowitz

2015, 3 min, Digital Video, Canada

Layered with light, KASHKA sings a sweet song of loss, memories and longing.