Maïa Cybelle Carpenter

Artist Statement:
I position my work against the narrative expectations of moving-image media. Through explorations of the material specificity of film and video, I seek to produce new dialogues with philosophical and current cultural approaches to visual form. Taking identity politics beyond overt polemics, my work engages its audience in multi-layered examinations of identity through spatial experiences.

As an artist, the practice of curating allows me to build a body of research around theoretical problems that I consider in my own work and to mobilize a community of other artists who also wrestle with these questions.

Bio:
Maïa Cybelle Carpenter is a moving-image artist and curator from NY and France, currently residing in the San Francisco Bay Area. She has a BA from Barnard College, Columbia University (1997) and an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2001). She is Chairwoman Emeritus of Canyon Cinema Foundation (http://canyoncinema.com/) and on the Advisory Board of Lunafest (http://www.lunafest.org/), whose proceeds go towards the Breast Cancer Fund. Her films and videos have been exhibited internationally including, The Whitney Museum of American Art, Ars Electronica Linz, Rotterdam International Film Festival, Pacific Film Archives, Ontario Cinematheque, Anthology Film Archives, Exit Art Gallery NY, Directors Guild of America, The British Film Institute, The Berlinale, The Taiwan Cinematheque, and PBS Television. Her films are included in several private collections in North America and her work is distributed by Canyon Cinema (USA), Collectif Jeune Cinéma (France) and Canadian Filmmakers Distribution Centre (Canada).

http://www.mccarpenter.net