Program

2 Lizards

Orian Barki Meriem Bennani 2020 USA color 23min DCP
date time venue guests rating
10/16 21:20 Spot Huasan A Two P
10/21 13:00 Spot Huasan A One P
Originally released as an eight-part episodic series on Meriem Bennani’s Instagram account, this mini-series marks Bennani and Orian Barki’s first collaboration. In COVID-era New York, two animated, anthropomorphized lizards move through uncertainty and isolation, finding tender and touching moments of community and connection.

Director

Orian Barki

An Israeli-born filmmaker living in New York, she has directed numerous short documentaries, focusing on coming-of-age stories in a personal and energetic vérité style. © Valentina Sommariva

Meriem Bennani

A Morocco-born artist lives and works in New York. She has been developing a shape-shifting practice of films, sculptures and immersive installations widely shown in numerous solo exhibitions and retrospectives around the world, notably been presented at the Whitney Museum, MoMA PS1, the Guggenheim Museum, Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris, Nottingham Contemporary, Renaissance Society in Chicago and Kamel Lazaar Foundation in Tunis. Often referencing globalized popular culture and the fractured states of modern society, Bennani’s films address the complexity of identities and the issues related to gender, exile, migration, community and the omnipresence of digital technologies. She weaves together humor and critique to explore the political force of collective life, while highlighting the power dynamics that shape our hyper-connected societies. Her works shift easily from music videos to animation, via found footage or documentary material, subverting dominant narratives and opening them up to new, often idiosyncratic and absurdist forms of storytelling. © Valentina Sommariva

Orian Barki
Meriem Bennani

Director, Cinematographer, Editor Meriem Bennani, Orian Barki


Screenwriter Orian Barki


Sound Meriem Bennani

Meriem Bennani Studio
meriembennanistudio@gmail.com