[NY Film Forum\ Renaud Barret’s SYSTEM K]
Jordan Mintzer of The Hollywood Reporter on SYSTEM K: “(An) eye-opening and eye-popping exposé. Tracks an emerging wave of Congolese creators whose vibrant, sometimes disturbing works are far more provocative than the kind of street art that now fetches millions at Christie’s or Sotheby’s.”
Photo: Film Forum
The Congolese collective KOKOKO!, in Renaud Barret’s SYSTEM K documentary on Congolese street art and artists.
Film Forum is pleased to present the US theatrical premiere of Renaud Barret’s SYSTEM K beginning Wednesday, January 8.
Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, is a vast, chaotic mega-city of 12 million. Water is privatized and the electric grid is capricious. Here, street artists’ performances are wildly creative, angry, irreverent, often shocking. With names like Kongo Astronaut, Strombo, and Kill Bill, they masterfully repurpose urban detritus (computer parts, TV sets, bullet shells, machetes) and work with fire and paint, wax and blood — to critique government corruption, Western exploitation (their nation was literally once the private property of Belgium’s King Léopold II), and entrenched poverty.
SYSTEM K reveals a vibrant, raw, politically astute world of performance art the likes of which exist nowhere else on earth. SYSTEM K will have a one-week engagement, Wednesday, January 8 – Tuesday, January 14, at Film Forum, 209 West Houston Street (West of 6th Avenue), with screenings daily at 12:30, 2:30, 4:40, 7:00 & 9:10.
Presented with support from the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation Fund and the Richard Brick, Geri Ashur, and Sara Bershtel Fund for Social Justice Documentaries.
“(An) eye-opening and eye-popping exposé. Tracks an emerging wave of Congolese creators whose vibrant, sometimes disturbing works are far more provocative than the kind of street art that now fetches millions at Christie’s or Sotheby’s. A full-blown nosedive into a unique moment of collective creation. [With] a lively score that includes music from…the group known as Kokoko!, whose instruments are made of used paint cans, scraps of wood, transistor radios, wire, and other detritus that’s been refurbished to produce beautiful sounds.” – Jordan Mintzer, The Hollywood Reporter
SYSTEM K (2019, 95 minutes) Written and directed by Renaud Barret. Produced by Thierry Commissionat, Guillaume Vincent, Benoit Tschieret & Renaud Barret. Cinematography by Barret. Sound by Barret & Paul Shemisi. Edited by Jules Lahana. Featuring Freddy Tsimba, Béni Baras, Kongo Astronaut, Géraldine Tobe, Yas Ilunga & Majestikos, Strombo Kayumba, Flory et Junior, and KOKOKO!. France. An Artification release.
For more information on System K and other Film Forum documentaries logon to : www.filmforum.org.
