FASCINATING FASCISM: Propaganda Films of the 1930’s

OLYMPIA (PARTS I & II) (1938) 15_Busby_Berkely_epic

An evening dedicated to the fascinating and propagandistic film, performances, and parades of 1930s United States and Germany. The program features selections from American and German musical films, including favorites from the king of spectacle, Busby Berkeley and Nationalist Socialist chorus line The Hiller Girls, propaganda films by Leni Riefenstahl, footage from World’s Fair synchronized swimming display Billy Rose’s Aquacade, and European Mass Gymnastics. Influential conceptual painter, Olivier Mosset, and performance studies scholar, Yasmine Jahanmir, will cap off the night with a discussion of how geometric abstraction and athletic embodiment converge in art and culture during this politically tumultuous time.