Mel Chin Screening: 9-11/9-11

KKProjects is honored to present a special screening with conceptual artist MEL CHIN, one of five international screenings, including the simultaneous showing presented by Creative Time in Santiago, Chile (Centro Cultural Palacio La Moneda, Santiago) and New York City (Tribecca Film Festival), in addition to Houston (The Museum of Fine Arts), Chicago (School of the Art Institue of Chicago), and Marfa, Texas (Ballroom Marfa). Questions and conversation with the artist will follow.

Animated by Chilean group Planovisual Estudio de Animacion and based on Chin's graphic novel of the same name (under the pen name Ignacio Moreles), 9-11/9-11 takes its twin dates from two tragedies: the September 11, 1973 coup against Chilean President Salvador Allende that led to 17 years of dictatorship under Augusto Pinochet, and the 2001
terrorist attacks on the same day twenty-eight years later, on New York and Washington.

A tale of two cities, 9-11/9-11 weaves a story of love and hope wrecked by overt and covert manipulations of power. For the film's visual style, Chin and the animators found inspiration in Francisco Goya's etchings, especially Los Desatres de la Guerra (The Disasters of War). The hand-drawn animation emphasizes the human and humanist qualities at the core of the film, contrasting the pure destructiveness of the S-backed coup that toppled Allende and the destruction of the World Trade Center.

MEL CHIN has been active in the post-hurricane environment of New Orleans where he is leading a project involving lead remediation of the city's soil, Project Pay Dirt. As is illustrated in his work internationally, he uses conceptual art as a medium for introducing awareness and healing to disaster states, be they defined by political or environmental effects.

Thanks to Ann W. Harithas for her generous support for 9-11/9-11.