New York Loft (1981)

• 85%
• 1981
• Barbara Hammer

"Both NEW YORK LOFT and DOLL HOUSE convey a strong sense of resourcefulness, this 'making something' out of interiors, specifically domestic spaces. And domestic they are, in an avant-garde sort of way. The filmmaker gives plentiful evidence of arranging things, moving them, adjusting, placing and re-placing. First are poles and sticks found; second is fabric, sheets, pillows; in a third section we see round things. Circular magnets, machine parts, film cans and the like eventually become visually paralleled with the camera lens itself. The lens is seen as Barbara films into a round mirror. How different are the visions of this woman-with-a-movie-camera from Vertov of sixty years ago! Each extols the camera-eye, but Hammer replaces Vertov's sociopolitical kino-truths with adventures in domestic space.