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A Brief Spark Bookended by Darkness – Brent Green and Brendan Canty in Live Cinema

Text about Brent Green's performance with original drawings 

“If Mark Twain were with us today, he would probably be engaged in endeavors comparable to Green’s films.”
– Saul Ostrow, Art in America

Santa Ana Sites #19
Brent Green and Brendan Canty
A Brief Spark Bookended by Darkness
a co-presentation between Grand Central Art Center and Santa Ana Sites

In co-presentation with Grand Central Art Center, Santa Ana Sites is pleased to present the 19th edition of their traveling art forum – Brent Green’s A Brief Spark Bookended by Darkness. Green will be joined by his longtime collaborator, Fugazi drummer, Brendan Canty on Saturday, April 28 at The Frida Cinema in Downtown Santa Ana.

During the experimental live cinema experience, self-taught visual artist and filmmaker Brent Green will serve as the narrator and musician and Fugazi drummer Brendan Canty will act as the percussionist and foley artist.  The evening features works that all have played at the prestigious Sundance Festival, including A Brief Spark Bookended by Darkness, Carlin, Paulina Hollers, and Strange Fates. Focusing largely on stirring visuals, live music and foley, the emotionally charged films enchant audiences through lyrical narrations and somber underlying themes with flickering stop-motion Southern Gothic flair.

Sites #19 honors the relationship with Grand Central Arts Center, who served as the incubator for Sites in its’ early days. It also marks the return of Sites to The Frida Cinema, OC’s only non-profit independent art house cinema.

About Brent Green

Working on his farm outside of New Paltz, NY, Brent Green is a self-taught visual artist and filmmaker. Green’s films have screened, often with live musical accompaniment, in film and art settings alike at venues such as MoMA, BAM, The Getty, Walker, Hammer Museum, The Kitchen, Boston MFA, Wexner, Indianapolis Museum of Art, Rotterdam Film Festival, Sundance Film Festival as well as rooftops, warehouses and galleries throughout the globe. Often, his sculptural work and large-scale installation are displayed alongside his animated films, he’s had a number of solo exhibitions, including at the ASU Art Museum, Site Santa Fe, 21c/Art Without Walls, Diverseworks Houston, The Kohler Arts Center and the Berkeley Art Museum. Green’s work has been supported by Creative Capital, the Sundance Institute, San Francisco Film Society and the MAPfund. His art is in some fine public collections including MoMA, the Hammer Museum, and the American Folk Art Museum. Green is represented by the Andrew Edlin Gallery in NYC.

About Brendan Canty

Brendan Canty is best known as the drummer in the band Fugazi. Canty joined Fugazi in 1987, before which time he played in Rites of Spring, One Last Wish, Deadline, Insurrection, and Happy Go Licky. In addition to producing records for all kinds of great bands (the Thermals, Ted Leo, Garland of Hours, Benjy Ferree) Canty frequently composes soundtrack music, primarily for Discovery Channel and National Geographic Channel documentaries and independent features.

In 2004, Canty co-founded the DVD label Trixie to release an ongoing series of music-related films entitled Burn To Shine. The series involves independent bands from a particular city showing up to perform one song each, live, without overdubs or corrections, in a condemned house. It’s beautiful. The films and performances are urgent and inspired, and the portraits of musicians and houses expose the transient nature of our world.

Trixie has also produced films about Bob Mould, Wilco, Death Cab for Cutie, Eddie Vedder and the Decemberists.

He currently lives in Washington, DC with his wife and four children and has been touring around with his new band Messthetics.

 
Practical Info:
Tickets will be $10 General Admission, $8 Students with ID, and $7 for Frida Cinema Members.
Doors @ 7pm, Show starts 730pm