MONO NO AWARE visits not/nowhere

Info

Doors open 6pm
Event begins at 6.30pm

This program will be a live, informal lecture/slide show with intermittent 16mm film projections that correspond with the presentation illustrating the initiatives of cinema-arts non-profit organization MONO NO AWARE. Lab Director Matthew McWilliams and Founder Steve Cossman in-person.

Based in downtown Brooklyn, New York, MONO NO AWARE constitutes a vital resource for the exploration, exhibition and preservation of the cinematic arts. For the general public, MONO provides access to specialized film tools and lab facilities, they present no-cost and affordable hands on workshops/training, organize free lectures and film screenings that foster an appreciation of the cinema; our histories, practices, technologies and possibilities. MONO initiatives deepen our understanding of community and visual culture through our relationship to the moving image.

NOT/NOWHERE's mission is to ensure that local artists who use new media in their work can access film and media equipment and acquire the training to use these machines creatively. NOT/NOWHERE are committed to Black and POC artists exploring new possibilities for owning the means of production of our work and finding sustainability in our practice. NOT/NOWHERE’s additional focus is to provide infrastructural support for artists working in all mediums and enfranchise people living or working in London to take pleasure in expressing themselves creatively.

Programme:

MAKIBAKA HUWAG MATAKOT, 2026
MARIA ESTELA PAISO: MONO EDUCATIONAL INITIATIVES : 2-D HAND DRAWN ANIMATION
40 SEC, 16MM COLOR, DIGITAL SOUND.

MAKIBAKA, HUWAG MATAKOT (Fight, Do Not Be Afraid) uses an abridged segment of Gary Granada’s protest anthem originally composed for the 1997 musical album “Lean”, written a decade after the assassination of prominent student leader, activist, and human rights advocate Lean Alejandro. The 46-second animation highlights the main calls of the mass movement during the violent Marcos Sr. regime, and calls on Filipinos to unite in the struggle against imperialism.

Maria Estela Paiso (b. 1997, Philippines) is a filmmaker who oscillates between moving image and printmaking. Heavily influenced by the parallels of drawing from memory and hiphop sampling, she has made mixed-media short films about responses to environmental transformations and societal conditions, and her work has been shown in Berlin International Film Festival, Sundance Film Festival, Cannes Film Festival, and Visions Du Réel, to name a few. She recently received the Prince Claus Seed Fund and the New York Fellowship grant from Asian Cultural Council, and continues to explore possibilities of using animation to voice out resistance.

Makibaka Huwag matakot! premiered with MONO NO AWARE in June 2026 as part of the COMMUNITY SCREENING hosted by the MoMA, NY. The film was made with the support of MONO through the educational initiatives, filmed at the learning lab.

DEEPER INTO CAFFENOL, 2025
COLLABORATIVE FILM : MONO EDUCATIONAL INITIATIVES
3 MIN, 16MM COLOR PRINT, SILENT

Moving image portraits of the instructors and participants of the Deeper Into Caffenol workshop offered in Fall of 2025 at MONO NO AWARE learning lab. Led by Matt McWilliams, Andres Pardo & Dr. Scott Williams. This is the first ever film developed in a commercial grade linear processing machine with a Caffenol variant. The developer was derived from used coffee grinds collected from local cafes, akin to the approach of biodiesel, not mixed from coffee crystals. The print was struck to 3383 color print stock and developed in standard ECP to celebrate the tint left by the 22 minute developing time.

MOTION AT A DISTANCE, 2018
LINDSAY PACKER, ORIGINAL SCORE BY ANDREW YONG HOON LEE : MONO EDUCATIONAL INITIATIVES / COMMISSIONS / FESTIVAL
3 MIN, 16MM COLOR, OPTICAL SOUND.

This stop-motion animation by Lindsay Packer with sound by Andrew Yong Hoon Lee brings Packer’s light-based installation and performance work into film. Color finds ephemeral form in soundspace. Shadow shapes emerge, interact and recede as luminous, temporary geometries call into question the divisions between analog and digital ways of seeing and believing. Lee's composition uses sound as material and is pushed and pulled much like paint on a canvas to create abstract textures that evoke mood and memory.

Generative relationships between luminous color and ephemeral form propel Lindsay Packer’s site-responsive work in performance, installation, film and video, photography and streaming media. She plays with the call and response of color and light, form and site, engaging an analog/digital continuum of shifting chroma and temporary geometries in which color and form are inseparable, reciprocal correlatives. Her working process pre-supposes all the elements she requires are inherent in any scenario and that it is her role to meet the unique circumstances of a particular time and space with non-hierarchical curiosity and rigorous attention. Site, movement, chance, and improvisation inform color and composition in all her work. A 2022 LMCC Artist-in-Residence at The Arts Center at Governors Island, Packer’s video works were featured this spring at drj art projects (Berlin) and Lamont Gallery (Exeter, NH) and are part of Color Forms at Project: ARTspace (NY, NY) thruoughout the summer. In 2021, she performed light work live as part of the virtual relaunch of MoMA’s Modern Mondays series and again as part of the The Moving Company and Friends: Vernal Equinox, produced by Essex Flowers.

Andrew Yong Hoon Lee (b. 1982, Canada) is a multidisciplinary artist, musician, and composer. Often working collaboratively, his work culminates in installations where relationships between media generate affective intensities of sensorial experience, examining the poetic, political, and philosophical possibilities of light, space, and sound. Lee has presented work, texts, lectures, compositions, and performances at the 13th edition of the Gothenburg International Biennial for Contemporary Art; Center For Performance Research, New York; Staatliche Kunsthalle Baden- Baden, Germany; Emily Carr University of Art + Design, Vancouver; The Stone, New York; Akademie der Bildenden Künste Nürnberg; The Poetry Project & Wendy’s Subway, New York; The Vancouver Art Gallery; The International Symposium On Electronic Arts, Vancouver; The Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada, Vancouver; Achtung Cinema, Paris; Kinoskop International Analog Film Festival, Belgrade; Ann Arbor Film Festival, Michigan; Radio Alhara, Bethlehem; and MONO NO AWARE; New York, among others.
Motion At A Distance was commissioned by and received full production support from MONO NO AWARE. The film premiered at MONO NO AWARE as part of the bi-annual exhibition of expanded cinema.

DEPRIVATION, 2022
CAITY ARTHUR & CHANDLER ARTHUR : MONO EDUCATIONAL INITIATIVES / COMMISSIONS / FESTIVAL
11 MIN, 16MM COLOR PRINT, OPTICAL SOUND

Just a year after losing their partner, Chuck is still battling nightmares and paranoia, leading them to believe that what appears in the shadows is all in their mind. They quite quickly find themself unable to explain the unusual hauntings and surreal visions that seem to keep intervening. Are these delusions of sleep paralysis a product of repressed grief, or are they actually real? Centered on the repercussions of trauma, Deprivation asks what limitations there are when it comes to blurring reality from personal fear.

CAITY ARTHUR (they/them) is a director, analog filmmaker, SFX artist, and experimental photographer with a focus on clown drag and horror. Some of their most recent projects include directing videos for the artist Junglepussy, supporting her on a North American tour alongside Tame Impala, in addition to their work editing and producing at Vice Media (and previously for Condé Nast). As a filmmaker, their work is influenced stylistically by Japanese and European horror films where narratives often intersect with fantasy and domesticity. Like their first short, a vampire horror film (LILITH) set in present day, DEPRIVATION explores the psychological effects of holding onto trauma from their perspective.

CHANDLER ARTHUR (b. 1994, New Jersey - She/Her/They) is an illustrator and graphic designer based in Chicago, Illinois. Her multi-layered practice, which focuses on themes of femininity, power, and individuality is expressed through her vibrant illustrations and colorful character design. Her work primarily showcases women of color and creates empathetic narratives inspired by her lived experiences. Her work has been featured with RAW Artists Showcases and Braided Magazine, and has worked with Def Jam Records (2020); Walker Nickel Design (2020); Ace Hotel Chicago (2021); Jukebox Collective (2021); and Junglepussy.

LABOR, 2024
JULIANA CERQUEIRA LEITE, ORIGINAL SCORE BY NIK COLK VOID : MONO COMMISSIONS / FESTIVAL
11 MIN, 16MM COLOR PRINT, DIGITAL SOUND

Labor continues sculptor Juliana Cerqueira Leite's research into the ways repetitive movements construct and deconstruct the built world. Four former assembly line workers perform, from memory, the movements that defined their work. Labor uses long exposure photography and techniques pioneered by Lilian and Frank Gilbreth in the early 1900's to draw parallels between the development of film and photography, and assembly-line based industrial manufacturing. The film and its original score by Nik Colk Void connect the material qualities of their mediums to memory and work, moving from animation to live action.
Juliana Cerqueira Leite is a Brazilian sculptor based in New York. She often works from the inside-out, producing indexes of movement. Her works in sculpture, drawing and video engage the complicated histories and possible futures of representing the human form. She has exhibited internationally since graduating from the Slade School of Fine Art (London) in 2006 as recipient of the Kenneth Armitage Sculpture Prize. Cerqueira Leite was awarded the Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant in 2019 in support of her solo exhibition Orogenesi at the National Archaeological Museum in Naples, Italy. In 2016 she was awarded the Furla Art Prize for her contribution to the 5th Moscow Young Art Biennale. She has exhibited her work in group shows in venues such as the Sculpture Center, (New York), Saatchi Gallery (London), the 2017 Venice Biennale Antarctic Pavilion, the Brazilian Museum of Sculpture and Ecology (MuBE, São Paulo), and Hordaland Kunstsenter for the 2019 Bergen Assembly (Norway). Recent solo shows include Instituto Tomie Ohtake (São Paulo), Nogueras Blanchard (Madrid), Alma Zevi (Venice), Galeria Casa Triângulo (São Paulo), and Proxyco Gallery (New York). Her work has been reviewed in publications such as Artforum and Frieze Magazines, The Brooklyn Rail and the MIT Drama Review.

Nik Colk Void is a UK-based electronic musician and artist recognized for her innovative work in experimental sound, genre-blending compositions, and collaborations. Her creative practice revolves around the unconventional use of analog and digital instruments—primarily voice, guitar, and modular Eurorack systems—where she explores new musical languages through extended techniques and cut-up self-made samples via synthesis. Her compositions span techno, club, electro-acoustic, experimental, and noise genres. Based in the UK, Void has produced eight acclaimed studio albums with her musical groups, released through labels such as Mute, DFA, Blast First, Editions Mego, and Industrial. With a background in visual arts, Nik has played a pivotal role as a producer and live performer with Factory Floor and Carter Tutti Void, groups known for their bold approach to electronic music and uncompromising live performances.
LABOR was commissioned by and received production support from MONO NO AWARE. The film was captured by the artist using a Rex-5 Bolex Camera & Time lapse motor on 16mm color film supplied by the organization. Exhibition prints were timed, printed and developed by our partners at ColorLab, MD. The film was edited on a 4-plate Steenbeck flatbed editing table and spliced with a CIRO Guillotine Splicer at our learning lab in downtown Brooklyn. Scans and stills were made possible with the Xena scanner supplied by our partners CineLab. This film was made with the support of Mono No Aware and a grant from the Yale School of Art.