presented in association with the The Exploratorium’s Cinema Arts Program and the West Gallery’s exhibit The Changing Face of Normal

[general admission: $10 / SF Cinematheque & Exploratorium members: $5]

The recent films of filmmaker/activist Ken Paul Rosenthal are beautiful and provocative works of conscious cinema that re-envision the way we think and speak about our individual and collective mental health in today's chaotic world. These transformative films weave personal and political narratives through natural and urban landscapes, home movies, and archival social hygiene films. Screening: the complete Mad Dance: A Mental Health Film Trilogy, consisting of For Shadows, a contemplative, multi-layered memoir that unravels the tangled roots of self-harm while coming to terms with one's shadow; In Light, In! a haunting, visual essay about the awkward and angry junctures where our culture struggles to manage its emotional distress; and Crooked Beauty, the much-lauded poetic documentary on artist/activist Jacks McNamara and the foundation of the Icarus Project. Program also includes Rosenthal’s I My Bike, a cine-poetic work traces the conflict between urban space and the body.

PLEASE NOTE: The Exploratorium’s West Gallery will be open prior (6–8pm) to this screening with admission included with ticket price. View this exhibit then join us for a filmmaker reception in the screening room at 7pm with the screening to follow.

About The Changing Face of Normal: We all perceive the world around us, remember the past, look forward to the future, and communicate with each other—and scientists and artists have spent decades exploring how and why we do so. Visitors to the West Gallery can investigate the workings of their minds and learn about the scientific study of human behavior at exhibits on attention, emotion, language, memory, and judgment. The space is also home to Science of Sharing, a project funded by the National Science Foundation to develop exhibits that let people experiment with cooperation, competition, negotiation, and strategies for sharing resources. In a very real sense, visitors themselves are West Gallery exhibits; the mechanisms presented here are just tools through which people play with and reflect upon their own experiences.

[Facebook event here]