Considering the many sculptures I’ve touched, novels I’ve read or movies I’ve viewed, it’s amazing how little I actually know about them. Was the artist right or left handed? Was the author drunk or sober when he wrote that line? Did that actress have a stomach ache just before her screening?
When faced with answers like, “That sculptor didn’t have hands,” “That author had to dictate the entire manuscript by blinking one eye for each letter of the alphabet,” or “Stomach ache? What about schizophrenia?” part of me just wants to say “Really?” and go on. Instead, I am forced, like it or not, to view the work of art with new awareness. And somewhere behind that awareness a question plagues me: Does the artist want me to know that about the process of this creation, or just see the end product?
The ReelAbilities Film Festival coming to Columbus Saturday, November 3rd through Wednesday the 7th may not answer all of these questions. But its nine films portray those who go through life on a screen of their own, a screen that reflects not just their destination, but how they arrive in sometimes overwhelmingly creative ways.
In “Praying with Lior,” I am challenged to let my own prayers rise as a boy prepares for his Bar Mitzvah amidst his Down Syndrome, while “Special People” and “Shameless: The Art of Disability” release my once-forbidden laughter while gazing at the “normal” world through the satirical viewpoint of people willing to question our assumptions of normalcy. “Crooked Beauty” confronts me with the definition of what beauty actually is — perhaps to understand beauty more as a process than as an end product.
Each film presented during ReelAbilities will be accompanied by activities and post-screening discussions with people connected to the content from unique perspectives. For example, “My Spectacular Theater,” a Chinese film set around making movies accessible to a blind audience, will host local audio description artists who actually narrate plays and films for those unable to appreciate them through sight. As I envision one artist describing another artist to someone ready to register the fullness of this experience, perhaps my initial questions here are not so important as the answer knocking on my mind’s door. Creativity and beauty can exceed any bounds we impose on them.
The ReelAbilities Columbus Disabilities Film Festival is presented by VSA Ohio and is a travelling program of the New York ReelAbilities festival. ReelAbilities is a fully accessible event hosted at five central Ohio venues and sponsored by the Saul Schottenstein Foundation B, Greater Columbus Arts Council, the Alcohol, Drug and Mental Health Board of Franklin County, and many others. A full schedule, movie trailers, event updates, and tickets are available at columbus.reelabilities.org or by calling 614.241.5325.
For more writings by Elizabeth visit her literary blog, windowsofthought.wordpress.com.
GCAC Presents is a bi-weekly column brought to you by the Greater Columbus Arts Council – supporting art and advancing culture in Columbus – in partnership with the Columbus Arts Marketing Association, a professional development and networking association of arts marketers. Each column will be written by a different local arts organization to give you an insiders look at the arts in Columbus.
