Catalogue > Un extrait vidéo au hasard

In I Cannot Now Recall, Kersti Jan Werdal guides the viewer through a selection of Yvonne Rainer’s dreams, chosen by the filmmaker from a collection of Rainer’s journals archived at The Getty Museum. Constellated first through Werdal’s selections, and then refracted through the readings of a street-cast filmed in LA High Memorial Park, Rainer’s dreams appear as nodes on an anxious psychic ecosystem. As the material distills from private reflection into script into performance, what emerges is a vital interchange between desire and disquiet. References to the medium of film seem to further entangle the relationship between filmmaker and subject, as well as the relationship between film and viewer. Joined by doubles and guides, in unfinished buildings and the depths of outer space, the dreamer explores her subconscious with a probing appetite for expansion and wholeness – but who the dreamer is exactly remains an open question.

Kersti Jan Werdal is a filmmaker and photographer based in California. Her film work centers around collective memory, hidden truths within cultures that experience(d) erasure, and place. Demanding the audience take a direct role while viewing, she typically situates specific plot-points opaque, and prefers to pivot away from the expository. Her films often focus on off-screen sound and framing of the subject to tell a story, while often working within a structuralist form. When scripted, typically material is adapted from various sources such as letters, journals, news articles, transcripts, and so forth. She is influenced by "cinéma vérité" style filmmaking and frequently shoots observationally however, she subscribes to the notion that all filmmaking is inherently subjective, and therefore narrative. She holds a BA in Sociocultural Anthropology from Columbia University with honors, and an MFA in Film/Video from California Institute of the Arts. Her work has shown at IDFA, Camden International Film Festival, Prismatic Ground, Pesaro International Festival, Festival Ecrã, Blum & Poe, Galerie Allen, Anthology Film Archives, Northwest Film Forum, and Metrograph.