Subject: ADFF FILM HIGHLIGHTS 2016



THE ARCHITECTURE & DESIGN FILM FESTIVAL (ADFF) – the nation’s largest film festival devoted to the subject of architecture and design, returns to New York September 28 - October 2 with a special lineup of over 30 curated films from around the world. This year’s festival boasts an impressive panel of distinguished speakers and lively Q&A’s. Here are some of the highlights:

A Journey Around the Moon 
Directed by Ila Bêka & Louise Lemoine 
2015 / 76 min / France / US Premiere  
 
From one side of the river to the other, Ila Bêka and Louise Lemoine tell us about the identity of a public space which has deeply changed in the collective mind of the city. Using cinematic language, the film takes us along the tumultuous river's ebbs and flows, and drifts into the intimate turmoils of the people during the journey. It's a rare example of a film in which a city is portrayed through a collection of personal stories. 
Friday Sept 30 @ 8:45  Tickets & Sunday Oct 2 @ 3:30  Tickets
Amare Gio Ponti
Directed by Francesca Molteni
2015 / 34 min / Italy / US Premiere
 
A picture of the man, the architect, aspiring painter and Italian designer who, over 50 years, has tried it all with untiring energy— from the design of a handle to the formulation of a town plan. “Architecture is an interpretation of life”, he wrote. A popularizer of the modern who ran the risk of indifference and being completely forgotten. 
Sept 29 @ 7:15 with Q&A  Tickets
Oct 1 @ 3:00  Tickets


Bowlingtreff
Directed by Thomas Beyer and Adrian Dorschner 
2015 / 60 min / Germany / US Premiere  
 
Bowlingtreff tells the story of the first bowling alley in the city of Leipzig and an architectural portrait of one the only postmodern buildings in former East Germany. Postmodernism icon and 2016 AIA Gold Medal winner Architect Denise Scott Brown evaluates Bowlingtreff as a remarkable sign of the time anticipating the Zeitgeist of 1989 when people had the bravery to claim freedom through peaceful revolution started in Leipzig.  
Oct 2 @ 6:30 with Q&A  Tickets


Design that Heals
Directed by Thatcher Bean 
2016 / 31 min / USA  
 
Can a building help stem the tide of large epidemics? Haitian infectious disease specialist Dr. Jean-William Pape has dedicated much of his life to combating diseases . In the midst of the world’s worst cholera outbreak in over a century, Dr. Pape challenged MASS Design Group to design a cholera treatment center where the construction process, as well as the finished building, could address the underlying structural and social conditions. 
Sept 29 @ 6:30  Tickets & Oct 1 @ 7:30  Tickets

Eero Saarinen: The Architect Who Saw the Future 
68 min / 2016 / USA
Directed by Peter Rosen
 
ADFF will kick off this year's festival with Eero Saarinen: The Architect Who Saw the Future, a film that examines the life and work of Finnish-American architectural giant Eero Saarinen. The film follows Director of Photography Eric Saarinen on a cathartic journey as he visits his father's visionary buildings from the St. Louis Gateway Arch to the TWA Flight Center. 
 Sept 28 @ 8:15 Q&A to Follow  Tickets & Oct 2 @ 8:30  Tickets


Facing Up to Mackintosh
Directed by Louise Lockwood 
2014 / 60 min / UK / US Premiere 
 
Charles Rennie Mackintosh's design for The Glasgow School of Art is renowned worldwide. New York-based Steven Holl Architects was given the daunting task of creating a new building to sit opposite Mackintosh's masterpiece.  Facing up to Mackintosh was completed just weeks before a tragic fire destroyed parts of the Mackintosh building including the iconic library, which was the inspiration for the Reid Building.   
 29 @ 7:00 & Special AIA Screening RSVP  & Saturday Oct 1 @ 6:00  RSVP

Fall, Winter, Spring, Summer, Fall 

Directed by Tom Piper

2016 / 70 min / USA / Sneak Preview 

Piet Oudolf, the most influential garden designer in a generation, has radically redefined what gardens can be, moving them well into the realm of art. This immersive documentary gives viewers a rare and poetic look at the creative process of this revolutionary figure, including intimate discussions across all fours seasons in his own private garden, and on visits to his signature public works in New York, Chicago, and the Netherlands, as well as to the far-flung locations that inspire his genius, including desert wildflowers in West Texas and post-industrial forests in Pennsylvania. Threaded throughout the film, Oudolf designs, installs and then opens a major new garden at Hauser & Wirth Somerset, a work Piet himself calls his best yet. 

Sunday Oct 2 @ 6:15 with Q&A  Tickets


Pedro E. Guerrero: A Photographer’s Journey 

The remarkable life and work of Pedro E. Guerrero (September 5, 1917—September 13, 2012), a Mexican American, born and raised in segregated Mesa, Arizona, who had an extraordinary international photography career. The film explores his collaborations with three of the most iconic American artists of the 20th century: Architect Frank Lloyd Wright and Sculptors Alexander Calder and Louise Nevelson. Using his outsider’s eye to produce insightful portraits of important modernist architecture, Guerrero became one of the most sought-after photographers of the “Mad Men” era, yet his poignant story is largely unknown. This film is a special co-presentation of VOCES and American Masters. 

Sept 29 @ 7:15 with Q&A  Tickets & Oct 1 @ 3:00 with Q&A  Tickets


Peter Behrens - A Pioneer in Architecture 
Directed by Alexander Lorenz 
2015 / 33 min / Germany / NY Premiere 
 
Peter Behrens was a versatile universal artist at the beginning of the 20th century, who was successful as a painter, architect, product designer and a pioneer for the development of New Objectivity and the emergence of world-famous Bauhaus movement. Although self-taught, he became one of the most important representatives of industrial architecture during that time. The film portrays Behrens' development from the ornamentation of art nouveau to the objectivity of industrial architecture and shows many innovative creations and future-oriented approaches. 
Sept 30 @ 9:15  Tickets  & Oct 2 @ 6:00  Tickets


Some Kind of Joy: The Story of Grimshaw in Twelve Buildings 
Directed by Sam Hobkinson  
2016 / 60 min / UK 
 
Some Kind of Joy: The Inside Story of Grimshaw in Twelve Buildings, directed by Sam Hobkinson, revisits key projects from Grimshaw Architects, From Sir Nicholas Grimshaw’s first scheme in 1967 through Bath Spa, Southern Cross Station, Eden Project and Fulton Center, we hear first-hand from the people who bring these buildings to life, and show the inspiration, design, and occasional trials and tribulations of delivering out-of-the-ordinary buildings. 
Sept 29 @ 9:15  Tickets & Sept 30 @ 6:30 with Q&A  Tickets


Talking House: Eileen Gray & Jean Badovici  
Directed by Elizabeth Lennard 
2016 / 44 min / France-USA

Panel to follow with Juliet Kinchin, Curator of Modern Design at MoMA, Elle Decor's Joseph Giovannini, and Artist/Director Elizabeth Lennard.

Talking House is a 44-minute montage of Villa E-1027, the iconic modernist villa built by Eileen Gray and Jean Badovici on the Cote d’Azur in 1929. Filmed today, and using Eileen Gray’s 1929 photographs of the villa and recently restored Le Corbusier film footage, the camera takes us through E-1027 as the couple talks and argues off screen about the design philosophy behind the breakthrough layout, interiors and furniture. Heated correspondence between Corbu (Le Corbusier) and Bado (Badovici) adds a bit of controversy over the later addition of Corbu’s wall paintings.
Friday Sept 30 @ 6:45 with Q&A  Tickets


The Architects: A Story of Loss, Memory and Real Estate 
Directed by Tom Jennings  
2016 / 70 min / USA / Sneak Preview  
 
Director Tom Jennings' new film The Architects: A Story of Loss, Memory and Real Estate follows the international competition to rebuild the site of The World Trade Center after 9/11. Focused on the unrealized design proposal from United Architects, the film sheds light on the importance of this public competition, delicately considering the site’s history, symbolism and future. United Architects was a collaboration between Greg Lynn of Greg Lynn FORM, Kevin Kennon of Kevin Kennon Architects,  Ben van Berkel of UNStudio, Peter Frankfurt of Imaginary Forces, Jesse Reiser & Nanako Umemoto of Reiser+Umemoto Architects, and Alejandro Zaera-Polo & Farshid Moussavi of Foreign Office Architects.  
Saturday Oct 1 @ 4:00  Tickets


The Happy Film  
Directed by Stefan Sagmeister, Ben Nabors and Hilman Curtis 
2016 / 95 min / USA

Q&A with Stefan Sagmeister and Ben Nabors
 
Austrian Graphic Designer Stefan Sagmeister is doing well. He lives in New York, the city of his dreams, and he has success in his work, designing album covers for the Rolling Stones, Jay-Z and Talking Heads. But in the back of his mind he suspects there must be something more. He decides to turn himself into a design project. Can he redesign his personality to become a better person? Is it possible to train his mind to get happier? He pursues three controlled experiments of meditation, therapy and drugs, grading himself along the way. But real life creeps in and confounds the process: art, sex, love and death prove impossible to disentangle. His unique designs and painfully personal experiences mark a journey that travels closer to himself than ever intended. 
Sept 29 @ 9:30 with Q&A  Tickets & Oct 2 @ 9:00 with Q&A  Tickets


The Novgorod Spaceship  
Directed by Andrei Rozen 
2015/ 46 min / USA / US Premiere 
 
Like an abandoned alien spaceship, the building of Dostoevsky's Drama Theater stands on the bank of the Volkhov River, only a kilometer away from the walls of famous Novgorod Kremlin. An architecture freak, unloved and uncared for, it sails high above the comforting provinciality of Novgorod the Great. Erected during the final years of Soviet rule, this remarkable example of modernist architecture has, for many decades, continued to mock the ancient heritage of the city, as well as the mediocre tastes of its populace.  
Oct 1 @ 9:30  Tickets & Oct 2 @ 3:15  Tickets

The Storyteller. After Walter Benjamin
Directed by Nathaniel Knop 
2016 / 61 min / Germany / World Premiere 
 
Storytelling is a way of sharing experiences. Walter Benjamin expressed the vanishing of the verbal form of storytelling in his 1936 essay, The Storyteller. Still, the desire to exchange experiences exists. This film investigates the visual form of storytelling in today's society. 
Sept 29 @ 9:45  Tickets & Oct 1 @ 2:30  Tickets

Where Architects Live 
Directed by Francesca Molteni 
2014 / 78 min / Italy / US Premiere 
 
 Where Architects Live gives an intriguing insight into the daily lives of some of the world’s leading designers: Shigeru Ban, Mario Bellini, David Chipperfield, Massimiliano And Doriana Fuksas, Zaha Hadid, Marcio Kogan, Daniel Libeskind and Bijoy Jain/Studio Mumbai.  
The film intimately reveals the homes of these eight architects, broadening visions of domestic architecture and interior design, and suggesting that this discipline is most suited to evolution and experimentation. 
Oct 1 @ 5:30  Tickets & Oct 2 @ 3:00  Tickets


Windshield : A Vanished Memory  
Directed by Elissa Brown 
2016 / 46 min / USA / NY Premiere  
 
Windshield: A Vanished Vision lands us in the 1930’s to reveal an intimate portrait of a patrician couple, a leading modern architect, and the story of the ill-fated house they create. John Nicholas Brown's fascination with modernism, innovation and the rapidly-evolving American building scene spurs him to commission what he hopes will be a “distinguished monument in the history of architecture.” Brown and his wife Anne select the young and ambitious Richard Neutra to build them a house that they name “Windshield.” Then, just weeks after the Browns move in, tragedy strikes. Windshield: A Vanished Vision explores the pivotal impact of the house on Neutra’s career and takes us on a journey with a couple caught between the values of their upbringings and their evolving social ideals. 
Sept 30 @ 9:15  Tickets & Oct 2 @ 6:00  Tickets


Workplace 
Directed by Gary Hustwit 
2016 / 77 min / USA / US Premiere  

Workplace is a documentary about the past, present and future of the office. Hundreds of millions of human beings spend billions of hours in offices every day. How can we make them better places for people to work and collaborate? What’s the next wave of digital tools to connect the office, the city and the planet? How has the office evolved over the last 100 years? And do we even need offices anymore? Filmmaker Gary Hustwit (Helvetica, Objectified, Urbanized) follows the design and construction of the New York headquarters of R/GA,  Workplace is a look at the thinking and experimentation involved in trying to create the next evolution of what the office could be.
Sept 30 @ 9:00 with Q&A  Tickets & Oct 1 @ 7:45 with Q&A  Tickets


Yarn
Directed by Una Lorenzen 
2016 / 76 min / Iceland  
 
Meet the artists who are redefining the tradition of knit and crochet, bringing yarn out of the house and into the world. Reinventing our relationship with this colorful tradition, YARN weaves together wool graffiti artists, circus performers and structural designers into a visually striking look at the women who are making a creative stance .
Oct 1 @ 8:00  Tickets
2016 SPONSORS
2016 MEDIA SPONSORS
LikeTwitter
Architecture & Design Film Festival, 200 E 10th Street # 1018, New York, NY 10003, United States
You may unsubscribe or change your contact details at any time.