Shelly Silver: Girls / Museum (2020)

30 Irving Place,New York NY 10003

08 April, 2022

Description

Free in-person screening, presented by the German Film Office as part of our monthly German Movie Nights Please join us for a special in-person screening of Shelly Silver’s 2020 documentary Girls / Museum at the Goethe-Institut New York. The filmmaker will be in conversation with Brooklyn Museum curator Lisa Small after the film. We are born into an already-constructed world – we don’t choose our own history, context, or culture. We each enter with new eyes into a culture which has already been shaped and structured based on the desires and power of others. This culture is most often opaque, hidden under the smooth surface of ‘the way it is,’ and ‘the way it was’. Museums are institutions that are entrusted to preserve – they are a repository of highly selective views of history and civilization. The artwork presented under the guise of education and expertise, has, in fact, been historically made, collected, curated and contextualized, by men. There is no lack of depictions of women on display, mothers, wives, prostitutes, artist’s models and muses – contemporary, classical and religious figures are all seen through the eyes of male artists. Taking into account this imbalance, through what lens should this work be viewed today? Girls / Museum is a voyage through the historical art collection of the MdbK/Museum der bildenden Künste Leipzig, guided by the expertise and insights of a group of girls, ages 7 to 19. Moving from artwork to artwork, century to century, they tell us what they see. Visit www.germanfilmoffice.us for more information.