TIL_22 Septimber 2017

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RAINDANCE FILM FESTIVAL
The 25th Raindance Film Festival is
now underway in London’s West End,
with a programme that includes more
than 200 features, shorts, webfest, VR
and music videos.
Films playing in competition include
Maya Dardel, starring Lena Olin and
Rosanna Arquette, and In Another Life,
set against the backdrop of the Calais
Jungle.
Other programme highlights are You
Are Killing Me Susana, which stars Gael
Garcia Bernal and tells the story of a
Mexican native adapting to life in the
USA; Black Butterfly, which stars Antonio
Banderas and Jonathan Rhys Meyers, and
is set in a mountain town grappling with a
series of abductions and murders; and
Barrage, starring Academy Award
nominee Isabelle Huppert and her real life
daughter Lolita Chammah.
The festival also boasts several
strands such as Women In Film and
LGBT, as well as a newly established
virtual reality strand (28 September -
1 October).
The festival closes with the international
premiere of Stuck (pictured), an
original pop musical film about six
strangers who get stuck underground on a
New York City subway together and
change each other’s lives in unexpected
ways.
Screenings take place at the Vue
Piccadilly. For full details and tickets,
visit www.raindancefestival.org
Ben Stevens
FREE BY FREE PAINTERS AND
SCULPTORS
Capturing the essence of freedom and
diversity, a new exhibition from Free
Painters and Sculptors (FPS) opens to
the public on 26 September at the
Clerkenwell Gallery. The exhibition
explores the principles, reflected in the
core beliefs of FPS, of free speech and
artistic expression and features work
from members of the group using a wide
variety of materials and styles.
FPS, an artist-led organisation, was
first established in 1952. Since its
inception, the idea of freedom has been
at the heart of its beliefs. In the aftermath
of World War II, it was vital for the group
to be able to protect the principles of
artistic freedom, free speech and
expression, and to challenge established
notions and values.
Clearly, since that time, there have
been significant, and positive changes in
attitudes concerning class, gender,
sexuality, race and religion. Despite this
progress, there is still a great need to
defend these values. FPS champions
and encompasses the essence of
diversity. Many of the exhibiting artists
will be present at the show at which you
will be able to discuss and see their
artistic representations of freedom and
diversity.
FPS was originally associated with
the ICA (Institute of Contemporary Arts)
and came to prominence by playing a
significant part in the establishment of
abstract art in the 1950's and 60's.
ALEAH CHAPIN WITHIN WILDS
AT FLOWERS GALLERY
Intimate, revealing and personal, the
latest paintings by American artist Aleah
Chapin explore the passage of time as
seen through the body; depicting friends
and relations, all of whom she has
known throughout her life growing up in
a unique island community on the US
Pacific Northwest Coast.
Following on from her internationally
renowned Aunties series, Chapin’s latest
monumental canvases continue to open
up a lesser-represented view of the
female form, expanded to include the
ageing figures of women in the later
stages of life. Set within a wild Pacific
landscape, Chapin portrays the physical
journey of the body in poetic terms,
imbuing the forms of the older women
with natural, sensuous vitality. The
paintings in the exhibition Within Wilds
portray mysterious scenes where elderly
women perform joyful nymph-like
dances against the backdrop of moonlit
mountains and forests. Groups of
intertwined figures jostle and cling to
one another, and in the case of the
painting There Were Whispers Among
the Branches, they huddle together,
apparently sharing secrets.
In a painting titled Under the Curve of
Time, Chapin traces the effects of
childbirth on the body, evoking not only
the closeness of mother and child, but
also a sensory connection to place and
time through the soft carpet of forest
grasses and fir trees around the figures.
Following a recent return to live in the
Pacific Northwest, Chapin has focused on
the detail of her natural surroundings.
Wild flowers found underfoot in this
environment, such as Muscari and
Taraxacum, are portrayed on smaller
canvases. Painted in dark tones and
covered in dew, the paintings summon
memories of the fresh earth scent of the
dawn forest; connecting the wildness
and timelessness of the natural world.
On view at Flowers Gallery, 21 Cork
Street, W1, from 4 October until
4 November. Telephone 020 7439 7766.
t h i s i s l o n d o n m a g a z i n e • t h i s i s l o n d o n o n l i n e