Join us for a two-part programme presenting the work of experimental filmmaker Naomi Uman.
Known for her hand-processed 16mm experimental films, Naomi Uman’s kaleidoscopic practice blends feminist perspectives with an exploration of documentary form. Her tactile portrayals of everyday life, women's labour, and the layered dynamics of shared existence reveal a world in which multiple boundaries—geographical, cultural, temporal, and emotional—intertwine and blur. Every borderline is at once tangible, fabricated, invisible, and imagined.
Programme 1: Milk / Bad Milk
Friday, 20th Feb 2026, doors at 7:00pm, screening at 7:30pm
Uman’s experimental documentary diptych follows a Mexican family on both sides of the U.S.–Mexico border. The contrasting rhythms of manual labour and domestic life at home and abroad shape an intimate exploration of community ties, cross-cultural encounters, and migration. Shot on 16mm black-and-white film stock, LECHE (Milk, 1998) unfolds amid the daily routines of a dairy ranch in central Mexico. Its sequel, MALA LECHE (Bad Milk, 2003), filmed in colour five years later, depicts the challenges of adapting to life in the United States. Both sensitively reimagine what ethnographic filmmaking can be when grounded in corporeality and mutual implication.
- Leche (1998, 30 min)
- Mala Leche (2003, 47 min)
Programme 2: (In)visibility
Friday, 27th Feb 2026, doors at 7:00pm, screening at 7:30pm
Highlighting women's (in)visibility, the programme offers feminist perspectives embedded in the filmmaking techniques themselves. Starting with REMOVED—Uman’s widely celebrated confrontation of the male gaze—the shorts emphasize women's alternative ways of being through filmmaking: bleaching out female figures from the celluloid (vintage porn), navigating digital space (video games), and experimenting in documentary mode (you will see some babushkas).
- Removed (1999, 6 min)
- Hardly Working (Total Refusal, 2022, 20 min)
- Unnamed Film (2008, 55 min)
Programmed by Lola Lemke and Saulė Agustinaitė