Conversations at the Edge: Current Schedule

Fern Silva in person

Fern Silva's invigorating, geographically-sweeping films bring together sounds and images of nature, ritual, and pop culture from Europe, South America, the Middle East, and the United States to explore ideas of travel and cross-cultural movement. "The disorienting whirl of the compass," suggests curator Aily Nash "connotes the kinetic nature of existence." For this program Silva presents five films made since 2010, including Passage Upon the Plume (2011), In the Absence of Light, Darkness Prevails (2010), and the Chicago premiere of his latest, Concrete Parlay (2012).

2010–12, multiple countries, multiple formats, ca. 60 min + discussion

Fern Silva (b. 1982, Hartford, CT) is an independent filmmaker and video artist based in New York and Chicago where he teaches in the film/video department at University of Illinois at Chicago. Silva’s work has been exhibited at numerous festivals, galleries, and museums including the Toronto, Berlin, Locarno, Rotterdam, New York, Edinburgh, and Ann Arbor film festivals, Anthology Film Archive, Wexner Center for the Arts, San Francisco Cinematheque, Roulette Gallery, LMAKprojects, White Box Gallery, and the Greater New York exhibition at MOMA P.S.1. Silva was named one of the "Top 25 avant-garde filmmakers for the 21st century" in Film Comment magazine, is the recipient of the Gus Van Sant Award from the 49th Ann Arbor Film Festival, and was nominated for best international short film at the 2012 Edinburgh International Film Festival. He received a BFA from Massachusetts College of Art and MFA from Bard College.